BOB ABERNETHY: Here at home, Littleton, Colorado, in mourning. A devastated community continued to search for hope and answers in the wake of the deadly rampage at Columbine High School. With the sad task of burying the dead came new memorials and continued grief. Across the nation, there are many unanswered questions about the methods and motivations of the attack and about how similar incidents could be prevented.

Since the Littleton shootings, we've heard here from clergy and parents and others struggling to explain the causes. Today, Tom Beaudoin, a graduate student in theology in Boston, a former high school teacher, and the author of a book about spirituality and Generation X. He joins us from Chicago.

Mr. Beaudoin, welcome. You know firsthand the culture of the young: the music, the video games, the fads, other parts of youth culture that have received a lot of blame. Is that blame, do you think, justified?

Mr. TOM BEAUDOIN (Author, VIRTUAL FAITH): I don't think that blame is justified, Bob. I do think it's important for us to pay attention to the popular culture that young people are engaged in, but I don't think you can point to that as a single cause of an act of violence like this.

ABERNETHY: But there were -- there is an awful lot of violence in the media, an awful lot of what's been called -- what? -- a culture of death.

Mr. BEAUDOIN: A culture of death. Actually, this is the pope's term, Pope John Paul II, for much of western culture. He contrasts that to a culture of life. I agree that -- and I play some of these video games, Doom and Quake. There's a lot of violence in there. But whether this creates a total culture of death for young people, I think, is another question.

ABERNETHY: But what counteracts it, then?

Mr. BEAUDOIN: Well, what counteracts it is life-giving relationships and other -- in other parts of young people's lives: good experiences and good relationships with adults, healthy relationships with their peers, support from institutions like churches. You have to have all these other forces to counteract that. And you have to, I think, admit that there's gonna be some element of depression and nihilism just as a part of growing up, and we'll never get rid of that.

ABERNETHY: But it doesn't necessarily have to lead to shooting.

Mr. BEAUDOIN: No, it doesn't have to lead to shooting at all, and that's why you have to -- if you're going to partake in these games like Doom and Quake or listen to Marilyn Manson a lot or other such bands, it's very important that you have a wider context in which you make sense of that.

ABERNETHY: To realize that you're -- that you're flirting with something that could be dangerous and look for ways to counteract it?