At this writing, I am packing for a trip to the Middle East with fellow Lutherans. After having lived and served in Jerusalem, I am sadly anesthetized to the recent reports of violence in the Old City that pop up every year during Ramadan and the High Holy Days of Judaism. It is simply endemic to the culture of conflict there, like the swallows returning to Capistrano. With these words, I reassure my fellow pilgrims, sad to say.
In light of the most recent school shooting in Oregon, I am reminded of a conversation I had with a Palestinian Christian before I moved back to the states in 2014. She asked me where we planned to send our kids to school, and I explained that, fortunately, we would live an area where the public school system was exemplary in providing educational opportunities. “So what!” she said. “Aren’t you worried about your kids getting shot?”
Try to understand the irony of the situation. This Palestinian woman lives less than a mile away from one of the most notorious Israeli military checkpoints (Qalandia, south of Ramallah), and she is no stranger to tear gas, gunfire, angry mobs, burning tires and street violence. Her husband lives in Bethlehem but cannot get a residency permit in Jerusalem; she works and lives in an East Jerusalem suburb. She routinely lectures her two young adult sons about safety issues in regard to soldiers and how to avoid being detained. And she’s worried for my kids – that they might get shot in a public school in America.
We pray for each other a lot. I pray for peace in her homeland as she prays for peace in mine. But I am tired of praying for peace in the Holy Land, because we know what needs to happen there in order for there to be real peace with justice. We simply lack the political will to do it.
Similarly, we know that gun safety laws reduce the chances of these horrific mass shootings. The lack of comprehensive gun control legislation in this country is the result of a financial stranglehold on our Congress by a powerful gun lobby that I refuse to name here. Our prayers become clanging gongs and noisy symbols, because we fail to follow our words with actual change.
As for the sadly predictable rhetoric surrounding mental illness after each of these incidents, it’s a disgusting bait and switch strategy by those who operate under the boot heel of the gun lobby. The data shows that mental health patients are far more likely to be the victims than perpetrators of gun violence. Yes, we have substantial issues regarding the stigmas surrounding mental illness in this country. Trying to make mentally ill people responsible for the gun violence in our nation is like blaming a confirmation student for redundancies in the Small Catechism. There is simply no way to cleanly connect the dots in this logical fallacy.
So what do timid Lutherans need to do? Well, having the temerity to talk about gun control in our congregational contexts is only the tip of the iceberg. We need to talk to our local, state and national elected officials, leading off with the question: “How many more innocent people will die before you do something about gun violence?” If it turns out your elected official is a lackey for the gun lobby, then perhaps it’s time to organize with other Christians in your area to speak out publicly and shame them into acting ethically on the issue. Yes, friends, this is a place where the church and state must intersect if we are to be true to the gospel.
My kids go to a great public school system here in Pennsylvania. I am afraid even now to name the district in case some angry man with a gun is reading this. I love my kids too much to even risk the possibility. This is damnably laughable. We should be ashamed of ourselves for our apathy and lack of accountability in this nation. We are our brother’s and sister’s keeper, and their blood cries out to us from the ground.
