Listen to thisHe was only ten years old when the bullets tore through the quiet of a church service. In an instant, the sanctuary that should have been safe became a place of chaos and fear. As glass shattered and shots rang out, he dropped under the pew, small and terrified.
That’s when his friend moved without hesitation—stretching his body across him like a shield. Another child’s instinct to protect, offered in the most costly way. When it ended, the boy stood shaken but alive because someone else had chosen courage over fear.
In the aftermath, his voice was soft but steady: “He’s really brave.”
* * *
This was the forty-fourth school shooting in the United States this year. This time in Minneapolis. Another community shattered, another sanctuary of learning and safety turned into a place of fear. Each incident feels unbearable on its own, and yet they pile up, one after another, like a drumbeat of violence that our society has failed to stop.
In the field of child and youth care, we engage in the real, deep prevention of tragedies like this. Sometimes that looks like the raw, immediate courage of a child shielding another. Sometimes it’s helping a young person learn to manage the anger and frustration that, left unchecked, could one day explode into violence. And sometimes it’s standing with children, families, and communities in the painful aftermath—offering safety, presence, and recovery when the unthinkable has already happened.
This is what it means to walk beside young people in a fractured world. Our work is relational, preventative, and restorative. It is not flashy. It is not loud. But it is where real change begins.
And it remains an uphill battle.
The weapons seemingly used were a Taurus semiautomatic pistol, a Mossberg pump-action shotgun, and a Magpul semiautomatic rifle. All legally and recently purchased by the shooter.
Cheryl Reeve, head coach of the Minnesota Lynx, spoke truth this week after the shooting:
It's such an indictment of our society, our lack of regard for life. There are things that we can do about it, and we don't, but for some reason as Americans we value something different…. It's sad for the kids that have to grow up like this.… The sad thing is we can't sit here and tell them that help is on the way, because we're not going to do a damn thing about it.
She’s right. After decades of school shootings and relentless gun violence, those in power have done nothing to stop it. The Republican Party has chosen over and over to side with the gun lobby instead of children. They’ve taken money from firearms interests, repeated gun industry talking points, and built a politics of fear around the lie that any regulation will lead to the government taking your guns. That fear keeps their base in line, even as the death toll rises.
For years, the gun lobby has claimed that widespread ownership was necessary to prevent a hostile takeover of our government. Yet as the current neofascist regime has openly dismantled democratic norms, these groups have done nothing but cheer it on. The one job they claimed to exist for was abandoned.
The lobby has been the amplifier, but the real blockage is political will. Republicans could act tomorrow—on background checks, on assault weapons, on safe storage—but they refuse. They’ve decided that protecting gun manufacturers and clinging to power is worth more than protecting kids. That is why, even after the forty-fourth school shooting this year, we’re realizing again that nothing will change.
Meanwhile, the work of prevention, presence, advocacy, and recovery continues. Often quietly, in classrooms, community centers, and care programs. The work of child and youth care is not just about helping kids survive bullets, but about helping to create a world where bullets never fly at all.
