Nineteen children. Two adult teachers. Killed by a high school dropout with emotional problems who was deemed worthy to buy an AR-style assault weapon at age 18. This was Uvalde, Texas, on May 24.
Ten people shopping in their neighborhood grocery store, including an armed security guard who tried to stop the shooter. Killed by an 18-year-old extremist armed with an AR-style assault weapon who posted his intentions, backed by spurious, terrifying racist ideologies, on social media before his shooting spree. This was Buffalo, N.Y. on May 14.
A beloved doctor who put himself between his Taiwanese congregation and a shooter. Killed by a man apparently enraged by Taiwan’s effort to become independent of China, a shooter who was captured by church members and tied up until police came. This was Laguna Woods, Calif., on May 14.
United Methodists are sick at heart over these most recent of the 213 mass shootings that have occurred in the United States since Jan. 1, 2022, according to the Gun Violence Archive. Of all the responses from bishops and other church leaders to the Uvalde massacre, perhaps Bishop LaTrelle Miller Easterling best expressed their grief in a poem posted originally on Facebook and republished here with permission:
Sit with me while I cry
By LaTrelle Miller Easterling
Sit with me while I cry…just sit with me
Don’t attempt to hug me too tight
Or tell me everything will be all right
Or usher me out of the room as if my tears are perverse
Sit with me while I cry…just sit with me
Don’t try to quiet my wailing
Or ask me what’s wrong
Or grab me and start praying – I may not feel like praying right now
I may be angry at God – I may want to curse God – if you can’t take it, God can
Sit with me while I cry…just sit with me
Don’t back away as if my trembling body is a disease
That can be spread like a virus
Don’t look nervously around the room as if ashamed by my naked emotion
Sit with me while I cry…just sit with me
And if you feel like it, cry too
The intrigues of United Methodist politics pale against a backdrop of blood-stained bodies lying on a floor. The Uvalde shooting – latest in a horrific line of mass school shootings going back to Columbine High School in 1999 – casts the UMC’s internecine squabbles into insignificance. Why do we continue to allow such evil to flourish when we have it within our power to establish laws and procedures that can reduce or even eliminate gun violence? Why do we Americans love our guns more than we love our children and neighbors enough to protect them from gun violence?
For this writer, the answer is that fear has overtaken faith. We fear the American phenomenon of rampant gun violence. We fear the loss of political power if we stand up to the gun lobby that profits from such fear. We fear the scorn of our neighbors if we proclaim that living out God’s love for all could forestall Uvalde, Buffalo, or Laguna Woods by interceding with the angry young men – and mass shooters are uniformly men and often young – who go on killing sprees. We physically arm ourselves against evil without first donning the armor of faith that will shield us as we seek more loving solutions.
Worst of all, we cower in fear, thinking ourselves helpless in the face of such evil. We are not helpless, but we lack the courage to disrupt our business-as-usual society by demanding commonsense gun control until it becomes a reality. Those blessed with the spiritual discernment that comes from constant prayer can see this fear for what it is: the work of demonic forces unleashed by the Father of Lies, forces that tell us we can rely on our own power rather than on God’s.
We are truly living through an apocalyptic time, not because of the catastrophes that have overtaken us, but because this series of disasters has uncovered the spiritual corruption at the heart of American society. We are living through a time when all Christians everywhere are desperately needed to proclaim and embody Jesus’ message of God’s unconditional, unmerited, unbounded love. Yes, we are called to weep at the pain we feel, but we are also called to use our pain as the impetus to pursue doggedly the path of love. We are called to resist despair, and to draw strength from one another so we can bind up the world’s wounds while with God’s help we can courageously confront the evil in our midst.
Uvalde. Buffalo. Laguna Woods. Parkland. Sandy Hook. Columbine. These and all the other incidents of gun violence are signposts that evil indeed prowls about, seeking to devour us. Now is the time to follow Jesus to the uttermost, even if means that we, like he, face crucifixion for our witness to the goodness and sovereignty of God.
Now is the time.
A veteran journalist and professional spiritual director, Cynthia B. Astle serves as Editor of United Methodist Insight, which she founded in 2011.