I've said before that I'm a Christian, though I admit I'm not a great one. I'm not going to pretend to be anything other than what I believe I am. That means I won't profess to be holier than thou.
I'm also no theologian, but I know enough to know why some members of the clergy need to stay out of politics.
It's not because of any separation of church and state, which I think is generally a good idea in most cases, even if too many people take the concept to insane levels.
No, it's because faith leaders are people, thus flawed, and that means too many of them twist the idea of being a Christian to fit their own political beliefs.
In the wake of the Annunciation Catholic Church shooting, hundreds of faith leaders from across Minnesota are calling on Governor Tim Walz to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
The delegation, made up of Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and interfaith leaders, delivered the letter to Walz and legislative leaders on Wednesday on behalf of more than 700 faith leaders in the state.
“A ban on assault weapons is not a partisan issue; it is a moral one,” the letter reads.
“These weapons were designed for the battlefield, not for our schools and churches. They are tools of war, not peace. Their only purpose is to inflict mass casualties, to maim and destroy. Protecting lives is a sacred duty. While we cannot erase the violence that has already occurred, you can make it far more difficult for someone to obtain these weapons tomorrow.”
An assault weapon ban is not a moral issue. That might be true if there were no moral uses for such weapons, but that's simply not remotely true, and these faith leaders clearly don't know as much as they think they do, as is clear in that last paragraph.
Every weapon ever devised has, at one time or another, been used on the battlefield. Bolt-actions and revolvers made up the greatest proportion of firearms used in the trenches of World War I. Bolt-actions were still the primary battle rifle of most militaries in World War II.
Today, they're almost as common as oxygen in deer stands across the nation.
Lever-action rifles were developed for use in the American Civil War and saw use in battlefields across Europe.
So yeah, saying something was designed for the battlefield is kind of stupid when pretty much every firearm was designed for the battlefield...unless that's going to be your argument on pretty much everything.
As for the morality, let's remember that modern Christianity tends to focus on Christ in the role of a gentle shepherd. When they say "What would Jesus do?" they tend to forget that flipping tables and chasing people with a whip is still on the table. They forget that Christ Himself told his followers to buy a sword and, if they could not afford one, to sell their cloak to buy one.
Christ was not someone who thought there was never a cause for fighting, and he believed his followers should have the tools to do so if it became necessary. He might have believed one should be slow to anger, which I happen to agree with completely, but when one's life is in danger, one should act.
Yes, some of this is my opinion, but it's based on scripture.
It's scripture that some of these so-called faith leaders have forgotten.
I find it troubling that some of these faith leaders are Jewish. How soon do they forget the depravity of October 7th and how brave Israelis with private firearms--many of which were AR-15s or similar firearms--stood firm against the onslaught of hate from Hamas.
These guns may be for the battlefield, but the issue is that we've seen too many examples of the battlefield becoming someone's front yard for me to ever allow people like this to decide what is moral and what isn't. Morality is in the use of these firearms. Their existence isn't immoral. They're tools, the same as the ax, the scythe, or the muzzle-loaded rifle of days gone by.
They have no volition of their own. They are tools.
It is people who are moral or immoral.
As people who are supposed to spread the Word, maybe they should spend less time engaging in politics and more time focusing on helping people find that morality within themselves, as they're charged to do.
