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It may be that there will be no salvation
for the human spirit
from the more and more painful burdens
of social injustice
until the ominous tendency in human history
has resulted in the perfect tragedy.
—Reinhold Niebuhr

W hen Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, taunted, tormented, and massacred 12 of their peers and a teacher (while seriously wounding 23 others) at Columbine High School on April 20 of this year, Niebuhr's prophetic insights about the banal and heroic aspects of human nature were fulfilled. The "ominous tendency in human history" and the "salvation for the human spirit" came together for a brief, but life-altering, interlude at Columbine High. It bears the mark of the perfect tragedy.

Some have even called it a watershed. William Kristol in The Weekly Standard (May 10, 1999) noted that as politicians "stumped on behalf of their favorite 'solutions' " in the wake of the Columbine tragedy, "the speeches rang even hollower than usual." Nancy Gibbs wrote in Time: "With each passing day of shock and grief you could almost hear the church bells tolling in the background, calling the country to a different debate, a careful conversation in which even Presidents and anchormen behave as though they are in the presence of something bigger than they are."

What is the "something bigger"?

The tragedy has been dissected into many parts: gun-control issues; uncensored access to dangerous information on the Internet; the violent media culture; the cliquish school culture; the need for parental oversight; the separation of church and state. All of these contribute to, but do not alone account for, that "something bigger."

I traveled to Littleton with the hope of answering the question that has haunted Presidents and anchormen—and us all: What is the meaning of that day at Columbine High School when (as one local pastor describes it) insanity fell like a meteor?

I arrived in Littleton on a steamy July afternoon. I stopped at my hotel only briefly, anxious to run the errand I had to complete before I could move forward with this assignment.

It took 20 minutes to get from my hotel to Columbine High School. It was west on 470, north on Wadsworth, east on Coal Mine Avenue, north on Pierce—and there it was, on the left. I immediately recognized those curved two-story glass windows of the cafeteria and library. Rachel Scott and Danny Rohrbough died outside those windows.

Barricades prohibited me from turning into the school's parking lot, so I drove another 20 feet and pulled into Clement Park, which shares the school's northern perimeter. Driving around the outer boundary, I came to Rebel Hill, where the 15 memorial crosses had been placed shortly after the shootings. (They were quickly reduced to 13 when a victim's father tore down the killers' crosses.) It was a steep hike from the parking lot to the pinnacle of the hill. I thought of Greg Zanis, the carpenter from Illinois, lugging those crosses all that way.

Three teenage girls were sitting atop the hill. "Father God, you hear their breaking hearts," one said. "You hear them mourning."

Bear Creek Junior baseball teams were playing on the field below this hill, directly behind the school. I made my way down. "Make contact, big guy," one dad shouted to his young son as he stepped into the batter's box.

I moved closer to the school, walking past a volleyball game where it was "two serving and five," and a picnic where Paul McCartney's "Band on the Run" animated a rousing game of Hula-Hoop Kiss ("the longer the hula, the longer the kiss"). The skies were blue; the air, fresh. The clouds hung gracefully over the Rockies. Balloons, bubbles, and barbecue created the impression that everything was as it should be in this perfect world.

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October 4 1999, Vol. 43, No. 11