Source: Theology That Sticks
December 3, 2015
The massacre in San Bernardino has triggered some of the most bizarre antireligious sentiment in recent years. Please note: I didn’t say virulent or abusive. Despite some of the unnecessary invective, it’s mostly just bizarre.
After politicians and others began signaling by social media on Wednesday their intent to pray for shooting victims and those closest to the tragedy, gun-control backers unloaded.
“[A]ll these officials can seemingly do is rush to offer their useless thoughts and prayers,” said a pair of pundits. “Stop thinking. Stop praying,” saidanother. “Look up Einstein’s definition of ‘insanity.’ Start acting on gun violence prevention measures.”
The angry and/or mocking posts and tweets came in spurts and spasms, reaching peak buffoonery with the grandstanding New York Daily News headline, “God’s Isn’t Fixing This.” And no, probably not. At least not anytime soon. But don’t go down that road yet.
What Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant ravings are to the right, the spewing of no-prayer anti-gunners is to the left. They represent two sides of the same overinflated coin—neither of which can buy anything close to a solution but both of which might needlessly alienate victims and other innocents.
As Emma Green wrote for the Atlantic,
The most powerful evidence against this backlash toward prayer comes not from the Twitterverse, but from San Bernardino. “Pray for us,” a woman texted her father from inside the Inland Regional Center, while she and her colleagues hid from the gunfire. Outside the building, evacuated workers bowed their heads and held hands. They prayed.
So, yeah, let’s stop praying. Because that’s pointless—unless, of course, someone is shooting at you.
Despite its self-assurance, the New York Daily News was exactly wrong. (Probably not the first time.) How so? Later this month the church observes the slaughter of the Holy Innocents, that tragic moment in which King Herod responded to the gospel by trying to murder the messiah.
It’s a terrible though often overlooked side of the Christmas story. But the senseless killing, the unspeakable loss, the inconsolable tears connect us across centuries. And those tears have the potential to remind us of where our hope for justice ultimately rests.
Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away. . . . Behold, I make all things new. . . these words are trustworthy and true. (Rev 21.3-5)
I suppose if you don’t believe in that hope, you’re free to jeer at those that do. Good for you. But many in San Bernardino do believe in that hope. I do. And we’re going to keep praying regardless of how pundits bay and bark.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
