Politics and Forgiving

[bunnyjadwiga]

The day after the Amish School shootings in Nickel Mines, an lj-friend of mine was unfortunate enough to post a link to a piece of religious-right propaganda about school shootings that's been going around for the past couple of years. (I was, to put in bluntly, rabid in denouncing that document.)

The religious right is still using that propaganda, claiming that it is the dissolution of the moral fiber in this country, especially as evidenced by the 'removal' of the Christian God from the schools, that causes these things. In fact, anti-abortion activist, and father of one of the Columbine victims, Brian Rohrbough went on the air at CBS in the wake of the Amish School shootings to advance that theory. I don't find any evidence that he ever apologized to those whose tragedy he had used-- the victims' families or the shooter's family. A flash presentation from American Family Radio still uses it: "We Kicked God out of the Schools" http://www.afr.net/newafr/wekickedgodout.asp .

But while they still talk on the news about Columbine, Virginia Tech, and a multitude of other schools, they don't mention Lancaster County or Nickel Mines. In fact, the Religious Right want people to forget the shootings at Nickel Mines. They don't fit the pattern, you see.

Not only were both victims and shooter Christian and Christian-educated, in a Christian community, but the families of the Amish victims did what Christians are supposed to do. They forgave. They supported and comforted the family of the shooter.

I just wish I could forgive what was done by the conservative media with the situation.

Comments

[northernwalker]

The Christian Right tends to inspire two reactions in me: "I don't like your God." and "Jesus is probably hiding under the bed wailing 'I died for *this*?!?!'"

*snicker*

[bunnyjadwiga.livejournal.com]

"Jesus is probably hiding under the bed wailing 'I died for *this*?!?!'"

I just finished reading Parke Godwin's The Snake Oil Wars in which Jesus pretty much says just that:

"They've spent two thousand years turning me into something out of Oxford or a Tennessee Bible college. Both my parents were Hebrews, I look like an Arab, spent all my life in the desert, and if they let me into one of their nice 'white' restaurants at all, I'd get the table by the kitchen door."

Re: *snicker*

[dglenn.livejournal.com]

Godwin rocks. Did you read Waiting for the Galactic Bus first?

(I also really liked what he did with the Robin Hood and King Arthur stories, but those have nothing at all to do with the topic at hand...)

Re: *snicker*

[bunnyjadwiga.livejournal.com]

No, I haven't read "waiting for the Galactic Bus" -- I had picked up Snake Oil Wars because I liked what Godwin did with the King Arthur legend, and then read the plot summaries of both books and was put off. But I was cataloging my books and found Snake Oil wars and decided to try reading it before giving it away... and got hooked.