Last weekend was spring break, offering students an opportunity to eat copious amounts of sugar, spend time with families, and take a well-deserved break before the final, end-of-school countdown. That being said, as much as schools have tried to disassociate the four-day weekend from religious holidays, there remains an undeniable religious overtone: either Passover or, in my case, Easter Sunday. It’s the holiest of days for Christians, symbolizing Jesus’ assumption of responsibility for our sins, which supposedly grants his followers a road into Heaven. Beyond that, though, Easter can be a message of acknowledgement for all people—a message of empathy. It’s a sad fact, then, that empathy is in such short supply in our world– a world filled with innumerable tragedies, like that which occurred in Sri Lanka a week ago.

But this is a statement that goes beyond religion. It instead concerns our astounding ability to selectively ignore that which does not directly impact us. Take, for example, the newly released movie Hotel Mumbai, a film depicting the horrific attack that killed over 170 people in November 2008. Until very recently, I honestly didn’t know about the movie, let alone the Lashkar-e-Taiba attacks on which it was based. Though, in my defense, I was only seven years old  at the time, and rightfully ignorant about such horrors, I find my long-standing lack of knowledge shameful. I have come to realize that my ignorance wasn’t just in respect of Hotel Mumbai—it was also related to tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes, and shootings. I also recognized a commonality among the tragedies that I did remember: Americans. Americans and home.

Now, in addition to spring break, last week also commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Columbine shootings. Among other things, the anniversary was a reminder of the American lives that were lost and the ongoing issue of gun violence that our society continues to face. Though it was certainly not the first such incident, Columbine is largely considered the beginning of the modern epidemic of school shootings. I can think of no incident more heinous involving the deaths of fellow teenagers. It’s horrifying, quite obviously because of the deaths, but also because, as a high school student myself, it struck home. It was, after all, just last year when our own school had both a bomb threat and a threat of a school shooting. The difference between me and the victims of shootings is only a few hundred miles–which lends itself to the importance of student safety in American schools. Still, there are people in war-torn countries entirely without schools.

The fire in Notre Dame last week, while lacking the horrific death count, is undoubtedly a tragedy that strikes home not in literal location but instead in our minds. It’s a tragedy in that a piece of European and Catholic history, an epic nine-hundred year old cathedral, was nearly lost. Since the fire started, nearly a billion dollars have been raised for the restoration process; multiple American aristocrats have pledged their support. Because of their overwhelming generosity, Notre Dame will continue to stand as a symbol of European and Catholic pride. It will stand, and then some more—roughly $400 million dollars more. The National Labor Union in France has estimated repairs costs to be less than $600 million, leaving a hefty sum of change in the already deep pockets of the Catholic Church. For context, I would like to note the entire Peace Corps budget: $396 million.  History is important, but still, there are people far from our homes, unable to define their history, concerned instead with things we take for granted.

It’s easy to point out issues. It’s easy to complain that money isn’t used appropriately, or pull the parent card and say, “There are people out there who have it worse.” It’s significantly harder to actually incite change, to recognize and work to solve issues beyond those directly involving things we hold dear. The point of this article is not to minimize domestic issues or to point fingers. The point of this isn’t to diminish the importance of change in our country. In fact, that is the point. As a country, America does need to change, to improve, to empathize. Too long have people out of sight remained out of mind. Too long has our news been written on the white-outed stories of horrors abroad.

We all know of the Columbine attacks, of the fire in Notre Dame, but why can the same not be said about the Lashkar-e-Taiba attacks or the Indonesian Tsunami that left 500 dead and thousands without homes? Why?