32 dead in campus shooting in Virginia

Talitha Tetelestai · Guest

http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1260892,00.html

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keepingthefaith · Guest

Yes that was a bad one TT really awful.

Nancy · Joined: 22 Jun 2006 Posts: 1097 Location: Illinois, U.S.A.

I'm glad you brought this up,TT, as I was going to post about it anyway.
This might have to be moved to a different thread, but I just don't understand.

Can someone point me to places in scripture that deal with this sort of thing?
Of course I prayed when I heard the news this morning. But then I asked myself why God would allow innocent people to die so tragically.

God is all-knowing+His ways aren't ours, but He knew this would happen.
I just don't get it! What good comes out of senseless murder?

Please direct me to where I need to be in scripture for this,okay?
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You O Lord are the potter, I am the clay,the work of Your hands.

bobbyc · Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1363

I'm not sure that your appeal can be answered all that easily Nancy. Scripture isn't really designed to deal with the reasons for gun massacres, warfare, natural disasters or any of the misfortunes with which mankind is plagued. Other than to say that we all have free will and so can choose our actions even though the choices that we make will sometimes go against any moral teaching let alone Christianity it's not an easy question to answer. If God had somehow miraculously intervened to prevent the shootings then that would have violated the gunman's free will. I'm afraid that America will need to look again at its Gun Law although I don't suspect for one minute that President Bush & Congress will do anything to make owning and carrying a gun any harder than it is at present. If a society wants to have the freedom to bear arms then it must accept the possibility that such arms may well be misused on occasions. If the conclusion is that massacres such as this one occur so infrequently that the rules about owning guns don't need changing then that's the price that must be paid. It's called 'consequences'.

Talitha Tetelestai · Guest

Nancy

I really don't know that I have an answer for you, but it is something I have spent a lot of time thinking about in the past.

I agree with Bobby that God gives us all free will, and unfortunately with that comes the propensity to do both good and evil.

I don't understand why the Lord seems to not intervene when something like this happens, but then one day I thought, well does He intervene everytime I choose to do wrong? no, He doesn't....and while I could fool myself that my wrongs are lesser in nature, to a Holy God, are they really?

What I am trying to say is that if God were to intervene to stop evil all the time then He'd have to intervene to stop me and you too..basically He would have to get rid of us all...and He doesn't seem to want to do that - He loves us enough to give us a chance despite the consequences of that for His creation/creations when we choose to do wrong.

One thing is certain though, He is good, He is the only God we can turn to, and if we weep, we can be sure He is too.

Sorry, that is not much of an answer, but it is all I have.

Nancy · Joined: 22 Jun 2006 Posts: 1097 Location: Illinois, U.S.A.

Is gun control much stricter in the U.K.?
Seems as tho drugs+weapons are the biggest problems here. It's too easy for people to get guns either legally or illegally....sigh.
My point or question was not so much that God didn't intervene in the killer's actions,rather that so many innocent people died.
It's just another one of those questions I'll have to wait to have answered until I get to heaven. I hope I make it there. Icon_0204

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You O Lord are the potter, I am the clay,the work of Your hands.

bobbyc · Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1363

Since a shooting incident at Dunblane in Scotland about ten or so years ago (no doubt full details are available via your search engine of choice) the laws about owning guns in the UK have been toughened up. That doesn't stop some people from owning them illegally though. In some of our inner city areas a knife-culture exists and we sometimes read in the newspapers of another stabbing or knife attack. There is anecdotal evidence to link gun and knife crime to drugs and/or organised crime but I'm not aware of any research that proves the link conclusively. Nevertheless I don't think anyone will argue that there is absolutely no link between drugs and knife attacks some of the time. When someone goes on the rampage like the Korean student it's inevitably innocent people that suffer.

helena · Joined: 23 Mar 2007 Posts: 12

As Bobby says, a knife-culture exists in some of our inner city areas and we hear more about that than gun crime these days, but there was a horrible incident in Birmingham a couple of Christmases ago when two innocent girls were gunned down by members of a local gang who were out to attack members of a rival gang. We knew the Minister & some of the members of the Baptist Church where the girls' families worshipped, and we were particularly shocked & saddened because it happened so near to home.

The university shooting must be dreadful for you, Nancy, and everyone else in the USA, and we really do sympathise. You asked about gun control in the UK. As Bobby said, it has been tightened up, but there's one factor that makes a big difference between the UK & the US, probably because of our different historical and geographical backgrounds. In the UK we don't have a Constitution and our citizens do not have a right to bear arms, and the vast majority of the population live in towns and don't actually need a gun.

I can't remember the exact figures, but the proportion of the UK poulation who possess a gun is minuscule compared to the proportion in the US. Some of the papers over here have said that some people in the States would like to see much tighter control on guns, but that no one will propose it until after the next Presidential election. Is there any truth in that?

(jtheb chided me today for being a sleeping partner and never posting on KTF. One of the reasons is that I have to find a time when his PC is not in use! The other is that I'm so slow writing messages that the discussion has always moved on to a different subject by the time my posting reaches the message board!)

jtheb · Joined: 21 Jun 2006 Posts: 1451 Location: second childhood

It isn't that I stop her, honestly.
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keepingthefaith · Guest

bobbyc · Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1363

Nancy · Joined: 22 Jun 2006 Posts: 1097 Location: Illinois, U.S.A.

I appreciate all those of you who have taken the time to respond to my questions.
Helena, you just go ahead+post as you see fit. Happens to me all the time in putting my two cents in-lol!

As far as the U.S. waiting 'til the next presidential election to propose stricter gun control, I don't know. It seems that the sportsmen+their affiliated large corporations seem to have more influence than the politicians in keeping guns available to everyone. Looking at it this way you could agree that "money is the root of all evil"......sigh. Icon_sad

I am surprised that more religious leaders+organizations haven't been blasting the tv,paper+radio with demands for stricter gun controls. It's so sad that after the fact people have come forward to say how disturbed this guy had been for many years.

Yes, we do need to pray to God as to how best we can avoid something like this in the future.
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You O Lord are the potter, I am the clay,the work of Your hands.

crystal · Joined: 04 Apr 2007 Posts: 308

Nancy whilst we have much stricter gun laws that does not stop people from having guns nor does it stop murder. The difference is that in this country you might need to get hold of the gun on the black market.
As for this young man having problems, from what I have seen the people who identified the problem had limited powers to do anything because they were worried about violating his human rights.
I believe that there are many people in America who have guns legally and do not go out killing people with them. As I see it the real problem here was not so much the gun laws as the fact that this man has a seve mental illness that was not treated.

bobbyc · Joined: 23 Sep 2006 Posts: 1363

Correct me if I'm wrong Nancy but my understanding is that each state is able to draw up its own specific legislation about gun ownership and that it is a part of the Constitution that citizens have the right to bear arms. Thus the only real differences between individual states are the age at which a gun can be bought legally and the forms of ID that have to be shown. Are there any states at all where gun ownership is actually illegal? Because (the possibility of) gun ownership is so enshrined into the National Constitution I think that most organisations, and this includes churches, will simply not see gun control as an issue worth fighting.

Sisyphus · Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2007 4:40 pm Post subject:

The second amendment of the Constitution is always misquoted by the gun lobby in America to the degree that everyone believes it is a constitutional right for Americans to carry guns, when in fact this is not the case.

The 2nd amendment states: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

The declaration that, "a well regulated militia" as "necessary" to maintaining a free state, and this is twisted and forgotten as explanation for prohibiting infringement of "the right of the people to keep and bear arms."

I have never understood the mind set of Americans and their need to own a gun and certainly never understood their desire to go kill something for 'sport' or 'fun'.

America is a young and inexperienced country, my house is older than the USA, and this gun mad mind set helps make them stomp around the world like an adolescent with a Kalashnikov AK47.

I'm afraid the pathological gun fetish of the Americans and their adolescent belief in their own ability makes them hated by one half of the world and feared by the rest of us.

I have many American friends and they are as horrified as the rest of us that their governmental system allows a gun culture to exist from the man in the street right up to national level.

Getting off box....
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".... love thy neighbour as thyself." is the hardest thing I have ever done....