The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, but violence takes lives away.                     Proverbs 11:30

In May, Baltimore experienced its deadliest month of gun violence in decades. Likewise Detroit in July; Chicago and its neighbor city, Milwaukee, in August. All across the country, violence takes lives away – police against citizens, citizens against police, and citizens against each other. It has shaken the foundations of our public life in general and our sense of community specifically.

In the name of full disclosure, I‘ve been around guns my whole life.

My father and other family members were avid hunters. They owned handguns, shotguns, and rifles. My father and his friends had a lease on a cabin during hunting season that had been passed down from his father. I looked forward to the time, along with the other hunters’ sons, that we would inherit the lease and keep up the hunting traditions. I could not wait for the time I reached the proper age for instruction and hunting license to take up my 12 gauge Ithaca “Deerslayer” and join them on the hunt. Later on, in another state where allowed, the shotgun gave way to a Savage Model 99 .300 lever action rifle with Leupold scope.

For a time, I served as a police officer armed with weapons for the protection of those in need, yet never called on to put them to use. I served as a police chaplain and crisis intervention specialist with a major metropolitan police department, and was also armed for this position. I’ve carried a concealed weapon permit ever since.

Later, I served as a US Army Chaplain, and while unarmed by DoD policy, was constantly surrounded by weapons and the use of applied force. Often, I would be present at some range practice where soldiers would coax me to fire the “weapon of the day” despite policy. You could almost hear the unstated pronouncement: “Let’s see if the chaplain has what it takes.” I let them coach me on proper technique, asked questions about them and their weapons, and bonded with soldiers on the ranges.

I can see the attraction of automatic weapons, assault weapons, large capacity handguns and the like. As my son, also former military, would say: “They kick ass.” There is a power to them. They can be beautiful, as when firing at night with multi-color tracer rounds glowing down range. The M203 grenade launcher reminds me a lot of the aiming arc and pop of the ping-pong ball gun I had when young. Not to mention the distinctive sound of a 25mm chain gun, or the “gut-check” of a HEAT round leaving an Abrams tank.

But there comes a time when the fascination with weapons, particularly rapid fire assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, needs to be confronted with the reality of the abuse of their destructive power. Let’s face it, no hunter needs that kind of firepower – I was successful on every hunting trip I made with a 5 round capacity shotgun which you had to physically pump and reacquire the target for every shot; and a rifle that required similar action.

And the unfettered fascination with open-carry laws in and around our communities is a tragedy in the making. Even the Earp brothers required that you give up your guns before coming into town.

To go about armed, whether open-carry or concealed, questions the very nature of living in community with others (outside of a narrow circle of well-know friends). I believe we are witnessing the dissolution of our sense of community. We’ve lost our sense of social conventions and civility that maintained our attachments and provided some sense of safety. To go about armed requires a certain mindset: regarding each new situation and person with suspicion, engaging them tentatively, actively looking for a threat either verbal or physical; and a willingness to use deadly force against another human being at any provocation you perceive to be a threat.

And for those not armed, there is also a tentative engagement in public situations, seeing others fearfully as a possible threat to their lives. Police officers are trained and have policies and protocols drilled into them for the use of force. It doesn’t happen often, but we have all seen in news feeds and video the tragedy that occurs when in high stress situations the training, policies, and protocols are forgotten. How much more so from those who have not been trained?

This is a far cry from “loving ones neighbor as yourself.” It is a distancing from “feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting those in prison.” Nor does it celebrate Eucharist in our lives: being called together, nourished, and empowered to be the communion of saints in the world to effect the reconciliation of God’s promise in Jesus.

It is time the conversation shifted (especially in the Church) from constitutional and individual rights to our call to live in community. It is time the conversation shifted to reconciling the racial, social-economic, religious, and nationalistic attitudes inducing fear and leading to violence.