The current Bravest Person in the World is a 15-year-old Texas girl named Cassidy Stay.

She has just witnessed the worst act of cruelty any human being can ever imagine: the slaying of her entire immediate family, her parents and her four siblings, ages 4 through 13. Cassidy also was a target of the shooter. She was hospitalized in critical condition but she’s now out of the hospital.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/12/justice/texas-shooting/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

Cassidy today stood before friends and family members gathered at a memorial service and quoted Dumbledore from the Harry Potter stories. “Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times,” Cassidy said, citing J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban,” “if one only remembers to turn on the light.”

How does anyone — let alone a teenager — stand before the world and offer comfort to the rest of us?

Cassidy lives in Spring, a Houston suburb. Ronald Lee Haskell is charged with capital murder. He allegedly barged into the Stays’ home and opened fire. He was seeking his estranged wife, who wasn’t in the house.

Her strength and courage defy description. “I know that my Mom, Dad, Brian, Emily, Becca and Zach are in a much better place, and that I will be able to see them again one day,” Cassidy said at the gathering.

My goodness. How does one summon the strength to say such things in public so soon after witnessing what no one ever should witness?

The nation should pray for this little girl. I’m doing so right now.