To my Christian friends:

[Lesleymo]

We are all heartbroken by the shooting in Connecticut today. These were innocent children, five and six years old. You are posting inspiring scripture verses on Facebook today. You are expressing your sadness. And you are saying that this is not the time to talk about gun control.

Well, I disagree. This is the perfect time to talk about gun control. This is the perfect time to examine your beliefs in the light of a harsh reality. This is the perfect time to ask yourself what it means to be pro-life.

Tell me why your "right to bear arms" translates into the "right to purchase semi-automatic weapons." Tell me how the constitutional "well-armed militia" corresponds to a fully-armed mentally ill individual who needs only to visit a gun show to obtain a deadly weapon. Tell me why your "freedom" is challenged by sensible laws that could protect my 5-year-old granddaughter from a senseless, fully preventable tragedy.

Do I sound angry? Good. I am.

Enough. I've had it. Enough.

[Lesleymo]

1. Posting this on facebook ...

... and expecting to lose a lot of "friends."

[mercuryblues]

2. I've

just been telling them that I would love to wait for a better time. However, the murderers won't give us enough time between their rampages to do so.

[undeterred]

3. FYI, some Christians are Pacifists.

Lots of Christians believe in the nonviolence of Martin Luther King and Jesus.

[Lesleymo]

4. Yes, I know.

Many of my friends have been posting on Facebook today. I'm so disheartened by their attitudes. Most of them are expressing sadness but saying that "now is not the time to discuss gun control." Argh. When on earth will it be time?

[undeterred]

6. Its time.

Its many lives past time.

[Tigress DEM]

8. Maybe 24 hours out of respect for the dead is a thought... but I do think rational gun control...

conversations shouldn't be all that controversial. It's common sense and should eventually become accepted as such.

What I think needs to happen is to have a calm and rational discussion and just keep it up until we get the laws we need. Become the broken record.

Like Mother Theresa with her ceaseless intent to bring mercy to the poor.

Like a river that just keeps flowing.

Like the tide - day in and day out - with the holy intent of ending this kind of senseless slaughter without going out and ripping people apart with our bare hands out of frustration.

Occupy the NRA and shame them into making these changes so that only sensible, responsible gun owner behavior is promoted. Many people who grew up with the NRA and the Second Amendment are the same people that would pick up a gun to go defend your life in the armed services or on a police force.

Michael Moore and Ed Schultz are Liberals and responsible gun owners. A lot of blue collar people are liberal and believe in the 2nd Amendment but would NEVER condone killing children and would HELP find ways to keep things like this from happening in the future if we could have the sane, rational conversations that are needed.

But during our grief when the wound is so raw, do any of us really have the strength to have that conversation with people whose presence reminds us that gun ownership has become more sacred than the lives of children?

I think that's why people are taking a breather. To mourn, to heal, to regroup and start the conversation AGAIN because it's one that will never be done until tragedies like this are nothing but a memory decades from now.

[hrmjustin]

5. This Christian wants gun control. I never understood people who claim to believe in Jesus

falling in love with a weapon. Jesus was not armed.

[undeterred]

7. + a brazillion

[LeftInTX]

14. I'm the same way

Isn't there a Commandment, "Though Shalt Not Murder"

And we also have laws against murder.

And weren't gun control laws originally to prevent murder?

The connection between Christians and the NRA has never made sense to me.

[hrmjustin]

15. Well said!

[Robyn66]

9. I'm a Christian and I think this is the perfect time to talk about gun control

I haven't seen any scripture verses coupled with saying now is not the time to discuss gun control. I have seen some RW nut jobs I know post things like that and that Hillary Clinton and the UN are coming after their guns for sure now, but there were no bible verses mixed in there.

My beliefs give me great comfort right now at a time of great sadness. I share your anger and sadness. Jesus did not teach the RW gun lust mentality so your applying that generalization to Christians is very unfair. I am also pro-choice. You would be surprised at how many Christians are pro-choice, pro gun control social liberals.

[Jim Lane]

12. I'm an agnostic and I agree with you.

You write: "Jesus did not teach the RW gun lust mentality so your applying that generalization to Christians is very unfair."

I'm angry about the way this country so often treats Christianity as the only respectable religious view. I can't so much as buy a slice of pizza without handing out advertising for "In our invisible sky-friend we trust" or words to that effect.

Nevertheless, I agree with you that this particular criticism is unfounded. I've been active in the peace movement and the environmental movement, often finding myself alongside people who were there in part because of their Christian beliefs. Therefore, to your observation that there are pro-choice, pro gun control Christians, I'd add those Christians who genuinely seek peace and who decry our assault on the natural world.

[Robyn66]

13. I think generality is wrong to begin with.

I think we all agree more than we disagree on most things. I am not going to criticize you for what you do or don't believe in or make generalizations about you. Just like I don't believe in people making generalizations about any race or sexual orientation. If you as a person as an asshole, that is one thing but I am not going to say "you know, agnostics all think bla bla bla" because that is not fair. But this isn't the time or the place for this debate.

As far as those "are you saved" flyer's, we see them all over too and DO NOT agree with them but we just laugh it off and forget about it instead of getting offended. And I did that while I was hovering between being an agnostic and a christian for Years!

So I think that we agree on the important things and I wish you peace and happiness!

[Sarah Ibarruri]

10. What kind of Christian would say this isn't about lack of gun control?

A Christian that says that, is not a true Christian. He's a fascist.

[ReasonableToo]

11. I actually heard some one say this is an "opportunity"...

I was incredulous as she said that events like this will happen as "the end" comes closer. As these events happen, it's an opportunity for more people to "get their hearts right" and then more people will be saved at the end of times. UNBELIEVABLE!

We need to get single payer healthcare in place that includes mental health care!!! For those who say that they don't want to pay for someone else's care...we are paying for it already. 20 little kids just paid with their lives today.

What the hell is wrong with this country??

[liberalhistorian]

16. I am a Christian and a seminary

student (although, since it's a liberal, progressive, social-justice-oriented, ecumenical seminary that also accepts atheists, agnostics, Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, etc., I've been told more than once by my more conservative brethren that it's not a "real" seminary-ya, whatever, pal) and I've been posting these very sentiments all last night and today on FB. I am SICK TO DEATH (pun intended) of those who post candles and "prayers" for the victims, but do nothing all but that, just wring their hands and pray, and get upset when someone actually wants to talk about how to prevent this shit, calling it an "offense to freedom." Really? Freedom? Whose freedom? The freedom of people to enter public places and spew it with sixty rounds of bullets per second? What about OUR freedom to be free from the constant fear of such shit?

I found it really telling that many of them were the first to post shit about not overreacting and taking away their precious guns, instead of on the human cost of such "freedom." Jesus would be really interested in such fucked-up priorities. Where the hell in the bible does it say we all have the freedom to have as many guns as we want, however we want, wherever we want, the human collateral damage be damned? NO FUCKING WHERE.

And don't even get me started on the fucking idiots who spout the shit about "God's not allowed in schools now, so of course this will happen. God's not allowed in gubmint, so that's why." What an incredible fucking insult to the victims, their families, and the God they claim they believe in.