Hello all,
Yesterday, a deranged man entered into a church in Texas and began shooting. When he was done, 20+ people were dead and another 20+ wounded. This follows on the heels of a driver in New York City plowing his van into a group of cyclists, killing 8. And that followed on the Las Vegas shooting that killed over 50 people and wounded over 500.
What the hell is wrong with us?
We've come to treat such event as routine. Horrific violence. Horrific murder on a mass scale. This brief list is enough for an entire nation's history, but it's just a single month's worth (and not even a complete list at that. There were 30 incidents of mass violence in the United States over last past 30 days. ONE PER DAY, PEOPLE!) They follow on an almost unending list of violence and mass murder from Columbine to Virginia Tech to Sandy Hook. We hear of these, no matter how great the atrocity, and shrug our shoulders. Price of freedom, or some such.
Bullshit.
I'm not pulling any punches in this letter, so you can expect my language to be a bit rougher than I usually express. But I am tired of seeing scared, wounded, and frightened people on TV and the Internet. I'm tired of seeing the pain and anguish of people who've had their loved ones snuffed out because of what? Senseless violence. I'm tired of cowardly politicians too afraid of their campaign donors to do something (ANYTHING) about this.
And I am tired of us being the only nation where this happens. You look across Europe and Asia and you don't see this history of mass violence. Yes, terrorism exists in places of political tension, but as brutal as that is, it at least has a purpose and a goal. What goal is there to slaughtering 20 church goers in Sunday service? What goal is there in sniping concert goers from the top floor of a casino? No, violence is the goal. And that doesn't happen elsewhere. Not on this scale.
So what's wrong with us?
The quick and easy answer is guns. We have too many guns and they are too easy to obtain. Well, point of disclosure, I'm a gun-owner. I enjoy shooting sports. But we are so past the point of no return on this it's disgusting. We absolutely need new gun laws. We absolutely need to get these deadly weapons under tighter control. And don't quote me those tired-and-false talking points about "if guns are outlawed..." and "I need my guns for my protection" and all that other bullshit. They're part of the real problem (which I'll get to below.)
I'll concede that guns are not the cause of the violence. They are however what is called in military circles a "force multiplier." They make things worse. A person who might kill one person with a knife can now kill 10 with a gun. We can't allow that. We have to intervene to prevent mass death as best we can. So far, we tried exactly NOTHING on this front. NOTHING. What the hell?
It's about mental illness. Alright, again, we've tired NOTHING on this front either. Don't just use it as a deflection from the gun issue. Let's consider some serious help to people with mental illness. The vast majority of people with mental illnesses are no more dangerous than the rest of us, but better care might help us identify those who do have the potential for violence and get them the help they need. Stop using this as a excuse and DO SOMETHING.
So what's wrong with us?
The real problem is fear. We are programmed by our media and by the powers-that-be to fear. We fear black people. We fear Muslims. We fear immigrants. We fear "coastal elites." We fear losing our jobs. We fear our government. We fear anything that is different from us.
African-Americans march in the street seeing equal rights and equal treatment and we white folk look on them with skepticism at best and outright hostility at worst. And the charlatans in charge exploit that by telling us anew how dangerous and unpatriotic and unAmerican they are! Fear them! And when we quote the NRA talking points about protecting ourselves, let's not pretend who it is we're protecting ourselves from. Black lives matter, they cry, because we full well how much they really DON'T to folks like us.
Not that we whites are doing much better in these times. A rather brilliant observer made a comment about our modern times in that we "white folk now know what it's like to be a nigger." Probably a bit of an exaggeration, but it does highlight the spirit of white America. We're disposable. Worthless. We're buried in debt to our medical and educational opportunities. We make half has much for twice the work. No one cares about us. Our lives don't matter. (The opioid epidemic is another symptom of this sense of helplessness.)
We're afraid. And we're lashing out because we life is just beating us all down.
So what are we going to do about it?
This is where I believe the Church can come in. The real Church, the one that proclaims Christ crucified and risen. The one that speaks of God's love for all people. Not the church that feeds the fear by portraying God as harsh judge and unapologetic supporter of the status quo.
Faith is the true counter to fear. When we have a God who loves and takes care of us even in the face of death, what have we to fear? Yes, life won't be any easier but we can approach it with greater strength and courage than we had before. And we can make things easier. We can reach out to our neighbors and, in very real ways, show them that they MATTER. Being there for them when they're down. Give them a shoulder to cry on, some food to eat, and help when they need it. Just as God takes care of us, he calls us Christians to take care of one another. And if we all do that, we can make a difference in so many lives.
But even more than that, we need to call for some real change. Our society is so sick. It treats all people as disposable liabilities instead of priceless assets. That needs to change and the only way it's going to do is to revamp our politics and our politicians. Enough with the voting to punish our perceived enemies. Start voting to make America a better place for all, for you and for your neighbors. Other nations take care of their citizens. We can do the same.
Let's make God's love real to people by changing lives and changing this world we live in. We are settling for hell on earth. That was never our calling. We are called into faith to be agents of change, to make things better. Now more than ever, we need to take that seriously.
Pastor Allen
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