Celebrating Easter with the words of Jesus seems appropriate in our little, mostly Christian, community. I grew up singing in church choir and loving the religion that taught the gentleness and compassion of Jesus. The teaching that meant most to me was “Love God and your neighbor with all your heart, mind and soul.” I understood that to mean, everyone on the planet is our neighbor and we are to love them as we love ourselves.
Perhaps that is the root of the problem. We aren’t taught to love ourselves or others; instead white male television preachers extol greed is good and if we pray enough we’ll get the wealth we deserve. We’re taught to strive to get the most we can in case there isn’t enough for all.
But wasn’t that the lesson about loaves and fishes – that as long as we share, there will always be enough? All world religious teachings have one common theme; happiness comes from caring about others.
So, how did we get to such an alienated place where a 24 year-old white male randomly bombs people, terrorizing an entire city because he says he was dissatisfied with his life? Or, because he was distraught over gambling losses, a middle-aged white man kills himself after shooting 586 people (59 died) at a music concert? Or after being expelled, a 19 year-old white male walks into a school and slaughters 17 people and then casually goes for a soft drink? Or, because he was taught to hate black people, a 21 year-old white male drove to a distant church, prayed with and then murdered nine people who were kind to him.
Where do we go from here? Some say we should just learn to live with gun terror because more people die by texting while driving than in mass shootings. Some say we should ban assault style weapons that have the potential to kill dozens or tens of dozens at a time.
Trivializing the slaughter of innocents by comparing it to personally lethal choices normalizes terrorism and that decision may well lead to reaping the whirlwind.