Mass Shootings - Overlooked Factors & Our Responsibility
Video from Wineskins
"It seems the solution to mass shootings always falls on someone else's shoulders...Washington needs to fix it. Therapists need to fix it...Someone else always has to do the hard work. Now, all of those parties can help but none of them are the sole solution. There is a missing piece in the typical conversation on solutions. Well, it turns out we are not powerless in this. There are factors that we can help with and we need to take responsibility to not only refuse to contribute to the problem but to help with solutions. We have a major fatherlessness problem in America. We have a major cultural fascination with violence. We have an objectification problem. We have a discipleship problem. The church and Christians need to do the hard work of evangelism and discipleship to help people grow to be more Christlike. Disciples of Jesus are not perpetuating these crimes. Only Jesus can change hearts. Congress can never do that!" from video introduction.
Absentee Fathers, Not Guns, are the Problem
"The father of the teenager who murdered 19 children and 2 adults in Uvalde, Texas said:
“He probably would have shot me too, because he would always say I didn’t love him.”
The father is also a criminal. He has an apparently lengthy criminal record. His most deadly crime, however, isn’t on his record. His most deadly crime is that he is an absentee father.
A father who doesn’t value his child’s life is teaching his child a person’s life isn’t valuable.
Sixty-three percent of teenagers who commit suicide are fatherless. Seventy-two percent of adolescent murderers are fatherless. Seventy-five percent of adolescents in rehab centers for drug abuse are fatherless. Sixty percent of rapists are fatherless. Eighty-five percent of teenagers in prison are fatherless.
And especially, 75% of the most-cited school shooters in America are fatherless — just like the teenager who walked into Robb Elementary School to murder 21 people..." from the article: Absentee Fathers, Not Guns, are the Problem
Masculinity, Fatherlessness, and Mass Shootings. Is There a Connection?
Video from Focus on the Family
"Craig Glass offers his thoughts on why many mass shooters are men who may have been influenced to commit their crime partly as a result of the pain of not having a father – or a good father – in their life." from video introduction.
So If Fewer Guns Won't Stop Mass Shooters What Will?
So our culture has so broken down, the family in general is so dysfunctional or non- existent how do we even begin to reach out to these angry young men who become mass killers?
Are mass killings the new normal?
The Angry Young American Male is now a major health threat to the rest of us
In general our communities and the support systems family and friends offer are sparse or non existent.
Gun Advocates and legislatures acknowledge that fatherlessness is a problem but what are they actually doing to help communities, to help with mental health issues. Is our society to far gone to save?
Despite these horrid events who know God is at work. He will not treat us as puppets but he will allow us free will to be evil or good.
It is up to each of us to pray, confess, repent and do what we can in our families and communities to find those who are lost and speak about our Lord and the Gospel centered life! - Andy