There is a whale in CT

If there is anything that could revitalize my blog it would be the recent tragedy in Connecticut. It seems as though everyone has a comment about the shootings. After forty-eight hours of people’s comments on Facebook, along with every news and opinion article that ticked along websites and on the radio, I was about ready to explode. I can be thankful I don’t have cable news channels. All the commentary reminded me that for every person that wants stricter gun laws there is another person with the exact opposite opinion who wants to arm principals and teachers and, if they could, the students themselves.

Much like political elections it seems that most people, but not all, are not only sticking with what they believe about gun rights but are more ingrained in their own ideals. Of course, a week after the tragedy people are still calling this one different – that it will in fact convince law makers to do something, unlike all the other mass shooting that have happened over the past decades.  This of course is true - it is different. Twenty six and seven year olds were killed (not including the adults). Their age is what is different. It’s what makes it different than the Virginia Tech shooting or other recent shootings.

In the wake of grief in Connecticut there are the normal people coming out and saying stupid things. People like Rick Perry, a public figure, telling the public government to stay out of it and not to have a ‘knee-jerk’ reaction. As if the public shooting of twenty children and six adults is somehow not knee-jerking.

Still, what’s even more pathetic? The religious community that controls the media – the mouths of Christianity. Judgment continues to be at the forefront. The Mayan apocalyptic firestorm feels more like Christian apocalyptic judgment of all the atrocities of this world, more than a Mayan prophecy.  Of course, much like Mayan prophecy, there is that church-that-shall-not-be-named in Kansas who feels they need to assert some god’s judgment upon everyone. In reality even the biggest haters of Christianity know that this group doesn’t represent the God of Christianity. There are, however, too many Christians in the media, politics, and in neighborhood churches preaching similar judgment on this town – just as they have when earthquakes, or other tragedies have happened.

My questions is this: when will this senseless use of God’s Word be stopped and people realize that we are acting too much like Jonah - turning our backs on God’s people? When will we as Christians be out of the whale’s body and in the city of Nineveh?

From news articles I have read it seems that everyone that knew Lanza were not surprised - making him an outcast to society. Even though mental illness probably had a role in this, it rings echoes of Columbine and other shootings. The judgment doesn’t lie in government or schools not being Christian enough. It lies on Christians and churches not being Christ-like enough – not being the light, the grace, the love of Christ in this world. We’re spending too much time in the whale’s belly and not enough time in the city of Nineveh.

We’re all God’s people. Whether you don’t believe in God, or whether you do and reject the idea that non-believers are also God’s children – we all are. 

We can all make steps in this. It can be as easy as loving you annoying coworker or that rude driver. Or it can be as difficult as loving that Politician that you hate, or that group you hate, or that kid that nobody seems to talk to. We can all have our views on holding our Bible in one hand and a gun in another. But we cannot hold the truth of God’s love away. We must be the love that God intended us to be.