We were driving home from school yesterday when the NPR reports came on. \u00a0Another horrific mass killing. \u00a0This time at a school. \u00a028 dead, 20 of them children.<\/p>\n
The sound of gun shots on the school’s loudspeakers were in the background of the news report.<\/p>\n
My six-year-old son said, “Mommy, did someone get really angry?”<\/p>\n
“Yes. \u00a0Someone got very mad.”<\/p>\n
Yet another horrific incident of mass violence in our nation has left us looking for explanations. \u00a0First, our need for the facts. \u00a0What happened? What could explain a young man’s rage as it manifested itself in yesterday’s senseless violence?<\/p>\n
Then, our need for a cause- a scapegoat<\/em>.<\/p>\n Gun laws have to change.<\/p>\n A culture that glorifies violence needs correction.<\/p>\n Our mental healthcare system requires more investment.<\/p>\n God,<\/em> for goodness’ sake, could be doing a better job of policing our schools.<\/p>\n If truth be told, the “sin” is on all of our hands.<\/p>\n And so this morning, I am left, in the face of no real explanation, and no sufficient scapegoat other than the One in whose name God tells us to pray, to do just this- to pray:<\/p>\n Heavenly Father, you say we can call you “Abba,” “Father.” \u00a0So we dare to. \u00a0At Christmas you come to us as a tender child who would lead us. \u00a0A baby. \u00a0Jesus. \u00a0Yet you have let precious children die. \u00a0You have let this horror happen. \u00a0For those of us who cannot understand your ways- and they are high- help us to find you in this tragedy.<\/em><\/p>\n And forgive us, as a people who have let this happen. \u00a0Forgive the young man who did not know what he was doing. \u00a0Forgive his family. \u00a0Forgive our country, for lax gun laws, and a culture that glorifies violence and then appears shocked when it actually happens off our movie screens. \u00a0Forgive our inability to stop our business to care for those who need help. \u00a0Forgive us. \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n And help us, Father. \u00a0Help us have courage to do the right thing now- to minister to those whose lives have been senselessly torn apart, and to work for sensible gun laws despite the politics, and to disavow the ugliness in our culture. \u00a0Help us to begin, in our own families, to love well. \u00a0To love \u00a0even when it’s inconvenient or requires a setting aside of our own agendas. \u00a0Help us to care for the vulnerable spark of the Divine in each one of us, like we would a tender baby. \u00a0Gently. Kindly. \u00a0With great care. \u00a0Help us to trust that your ways, when we cannot understand them, will work themselves out even in this inexplainable and unfathomable pain. \u00a0In Jesus’ name. Amen.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We were driving home from school yesterday when the NPR reports came on. \u00a0Another horrific mass killing. \u00a0This time at a school. \u00a028 dead, 20 of them children. The sound of gun shots on the school’s loudspeakers were in the background of the news report. My six-year-old son said, “Mommy, did someone get really angry?”…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":461,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,180,130],"tags":[1389,1388,1385,1386,1387,1384],"class_list":["post-3361","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christianity-and-culture","category-christianity-in-politics","category-suffering","tag-adam-lansa","tag-connecticut","tag-gun-violence","tag-mass-shootings","tag-newtown","tag-sandy-hook-elementary-school"],"yoast_head":"\n