James K.A. Smith, a noted philosopher and Christian political theologian at Calvin University, tweeted in response to the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting horror: “We’ve taken too long. Habitualities built up over a 200 year history will not be undone by tweaks on policy and half measures. We need the collective will to repeal the 2nd Amendment and confiscate guns. Only Mammon and our idols prevent us from doing so. Burn them down.”
The tradition of Christian realism can object to Smith’s proposal from several angles. First, supermajorities required from Congress and from state legislatures to remove a constitutional amendment are virtually unattainable. Second, this amendment protecting the right to bear arms is part of the storied Bill of Rights, added to the U.S. Constitution at the urging of James Madison and other Founding Fathers as additional protection against tyranny. Third, protections for some level of private gun ownership presume that government can overreach, and individual liberties must be protected. The Bill of Rights guards the freedom of speech and religion, gun ownership, protection from unreasonable search and seizure, trial by jury, and speedy trials.
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Comment by Dan W on May 31, 2022 at 12:54 pm
The obvious short-term solution is making schools safer. No student, teacher or staff should be subjected to violence of any kind. No unauthorized person should get beyond the school lobby.
As for the political fighting, I don’t believe our “leaders” want a solution. Safe schools should be an issue everyone supports.
The real issue is evil. The Holy Spirit, Holy Scripture and prayer are our best defense against this spiritual offense.
Comment by Pat on May 31, 2022 at 3:23 pm
James K.A. Smith is wrong. Another university professor who would subject all of us, as citizens, if he could to no ability to defend ourselves from the evil in this world. Put Smith in the killing fields of Chicago today, with no way to defend himself, the gang/cartel infested cities who kill the innocent with no regret and tell those folks who they have no right to defend themselves.
Comment by David on June 1, 2022 at 12:10 pm
Much of our existing stock of school buildings was constructed in the 1950s for the huge wave of Boomers. Many of these schools have large ground level windows. These are obviously indefensible. With military-style weapons, it is possible to blast your way through doors and windows as illustrated by the Sandy Hook incident. The schools that I attended in the distant past were wide open all day with no security guards. That has since changed. Areas with lower levels of gun ownership tend to have fewer problems despite what the gun lobby says.
Comment by George on June 5, 2022 at 2:02 pm
Maybe if Jame K.A. Smith had been a German Jew in 1938 or a Cambodian in 1975, his attitude toward an armed society would be different. There are thousands of these examples. Take your pick. Protecting our children should not be about firearms. The root causes are the lack of loving parents, the availability of vile video games, and the filth and lies that are found on the internet. A wise man once said that to trade one’s liberty for a little safety, deserves neither.
Comment by Search4Truth on June 5, 2022 at 7:39 pm
This terrible tragedy that has been taking place in our schools and other public locations has little to do with guns, but a change in cultural attitudes over the last few decades. I submitted the following letter to my members of congress last week and this is a good place to continue the real discussion needed for change.
I pray that in the wake of another terrible tragedy, and yes, it is terrible and a tragedy, that you do not fall victim to the screams of liberals who have decided that the perpetrator of these tragedy is the weapons that law abiding citizens hold in accordance with the second amendment. People kill, guns do not, but the liberals are looking for easy answers instead of their failed programs and the culture it has created. Rather than looking for the obvious, and incorrect, answer, I would like to propose two major causes for what we are sadly experiencing in our country; and you are not going to like the conclusions.
First of all, we have removed God, sin and redemption from our cultural understanding. The self is the final for right and wrong and even reality. It doesn’t matter that when one “self” disagrees with another “self” and both, though diametrically opposed to each other, are intrinsically convinced only they know the truth. This is what our schools and culture are teaching our young people. Yet the only path forward here is violence. And since the self is the final authority, we are each supposed to feel wonderful about ourselves – there is no room for feeling inadequate, then confusion and depression set in.
Secondly. and probably more controversial is my belief that abortion has impacted our culture’s view of the value of life. Margaret Sanger founded Planned Parenthood to control the black population by killing black babies – her words, not mine, check your history. Medicine, science, ethics and religion all agree that life begins at conception, but in our “me’ culture there is no respect for anything that the self doesn’t see as a personal benefit. Mother Theresa famously asked, “If a mother can kill her baby, what violence can we condemn?”
Until we address these two beliefs that have become deeply ingrained in our society and realize that declaring an area a “gun free zone” is nothing more than an invitation to the disaffected crazies to express their outrage.