NEWTOWN, Conn. — Disturbing trends of violence in society should prompt both policy examinations and cultural changes, said committee leaders of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
“It is time for our nation to renew a culture of life in our society,” said Bishop Stephen Blaire of Stockton, Calif., Bishop John Wester of Salt Lake City and Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Ind.
The bishops, who respectively lead the U.S. bishops' Committees on Domestic Justice and Human Development, Communications and Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth, released a Dec. 21 statement responding to a recent mass shooting.
They urged a reconsideration of national firearm policies, mental-health treatment availability and violence in the entertainment industry, as well as broader efforts to restore the value that society places on human life.
On Dec. 14, a gunman identified as 20-year-old Adam Lanza opened fire on teachers and students at Sandy Hook School in Newtown, Conn. He killed 27 people — including his mother and 20 elementary-school students — before taking his own life.
Offering a message of comfort and peace, the bishops extended their prayerful solidarity to all those affected by the “horrific evil.”
“No words can capture your suffering,” they acknowledged. “We look to Christ, his words and deeds and, ultimately, to his cross and resurrection. It is in Jesus that we place our hope.”
To counter such violent acts, America’s elected leaders should consider reasonable limits on firearms that do not infringe upon people’s rights, the bishops said. While they acknowledged that “the intent to protect one's loved ones is an honorable one,” they added that “guns are too easily accessible.”
The bishops reiterated the call made in their 2000 statement “Responsibility, Rehabilitation and Restoration: A Catholic Perspective on Crime and Criminal Justice” for legislation aimed at protecting society “from the violence associated with easy access to deadly weapons including assault weapons.”
They voiced their support for the “sensible regulations of handguns,” such as “measures that control the sale and use of firearms” and efforts to prevent their unauthorized use.
Video Violence
The bishops also encouraged an evaluation of the impact that violent movies and video games have on the culture.
Entertainers should recognize that when their products glorify violence, they also “prey on the insecurities and immaturity of our young people,” they said. “Such portrayals of violence have desensitized all of us,” they added, stressing that society must acknowledge the “emotional, psychological and spiritual effects” that these entertainment products have on people.
In addition, the bishops highlighted the need to address society’s treatment of those with mental illnesses. Recognizing the “pervasive role of addiction and mental illness in crime,” they encouraged reflection on social fears and prejudices toward those with special mental-health needs.
Emphasizing the importance of sensitivity and support, they also urged the removal of “burdensome health-care policies” that prevent those in need from receiving help.
“There is no shame in seeking help for oneself or others,” they said. “The only shame is in refusing to provide care and support.”
The bishops called on Catholics and “all people of goodwill to help bring about a culture of life and peace.”
“The events in Newtown call us to turn to Our Lord in prayer and to witness more profoundly Christ's perfect love, mercy and compassion,” they stressed. “We must confront violence with love.”
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Students are taught that life on earth is the result of a random, unplanned bio-chemical accident, and human beings are merely highly evolved animals. They are not specifically taught that God is a myth and human life has no ultimate meaning. But they don’t have to be taught that, as they’re smart enough to draw the conclusion themselves.
And then we wonder why so many people in our society do not value life??
“Be of good cheer!” (John 16:33)
http://www.MerryCatholic.com
“‘It is time for our nation to renew a culture of life in our society,’ said Bishop Stephen Blaire of Stockton, Calif., Bishop John Wester of Salt Lake City and Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Ind.”
And a good place to start Bishops Blaire, Wester and Rhoades would be with your brother bishops, clergy and the laity who some 40 years after Roe v Wade continue to give their name identification and votes to the pro-abortion, pro-homosexual “marriage,” and pro-covet your neighbors’ goods party? The despicable Democrat Party is the home of the culture of death and immorality and the Left, which is the most powerful religion today; so, why does the Catholic Church in the now United States of Chicago continue to be its single, largest voting block?
“Oh shut up and preach Christ crucified.”
Stephen Blaire, you little left-wing activist rascle. I knew you would figure a way you can slither into being a voice for the Marxist Democrat Party. Let’s Ban the 2nd Amendment. You didn’t say you wanted to ban the 2nd Amendment you say? Well, the result of what you and your Marxist comrades are proposing would do just that. Instead of speaking in generalities, why don’t you call on your comrades to “Overturn Roe vs Wade”? Wouldn’t that be a good place to start for promoting the Culture of Life?
Have the bishops and all of us considered how many children are unbaptized, grow up in homes with no knowledge of God and His laws, and are unprotected spiritually against the onslaught of messages and practices which they receive daily from the secular world? Knowledge of and training in morality is sorely needed and must be given at home and at church from early ages. We need to examine our consciences about what we have failed to do.
I agree with the above comment. The universities play a role in shaping minds .. just as the holocaust was clearly the outcome of university lecture halls in pre-hitler days. I am very concerned that many universities deny the reality of the human soul, the interior life, virtue, the Transcendent, etc.. It causes a totalitarian mind, for their is nothing beyond ‘me’.. a narcissism occurs. Our psychologists have been remiss in not extending the truth of the human person… it is all as if “my neurons made me do it”.. therefore , there is no evil, no sin, no control, no guilt, no accountability.. and let’s face it, from the pulpit one almost never hears of sin… priests wake up!... it is your duty to uncover sin and evil in the world.. you have not been doing that for decades.. if you don’t , people will simply avail themselves of more and more lewd acts. .. I was told years ago, if the priest don’t listen to the Magisterium, if sin is ‘archaic’, if that ‘guy’ in Rome has nothing to say, if it is all a ‘myth’, then many of those same people (priests) will take advantage of opportunities for evil. .their consciences are ‘nil’.... We all have to get with it!.. there is much more than academic studies, science,,, we have to find God and to cling to Him… best place for that is in the Catholic Church and in her teachings.. our young people have very very poorly developed consciences because their elders have abandoned the tenets of what is right and wrong… Dosteovky said it inded right:“if God doesn’t exit, then anything is permitted”... We Catholics need a major reform, a re-conversion, shame on those who thought they could ‘go it alone’, .. we have become narcissistic social Darwninists.. abortion, mass -shootings, all sense of respect for human life has gone. We are in trouble.. all of us. Repent, pray, be real, seek God, fast, obey your Church (or get out!), and offer sacrifices. Read lives of the saints.. we’ve got it all in the Catholic Church!.. why have we been avoiding it like the plague?.. the others out there have offered us something better?.. tell us!...its all death. We are out of control in terms of money, sex and sexuality, technology, respect for life, family, marriage… and have just elected the most militantly pro-abortion president ever! what the hell !
paul from toronto, deeply concerned, and like the rest, heart-brokened over the people of Newtown.
We should not be surprised at the coarseness of our society. We have been ‘legally’ killing babies in the womb for 40 years. The clergy deserves some of the blame. Ever since Vatican II and the US falling into debauchery with ‘free love’ & the use of artificial contraception and then the legalization of abortion, the clergy fell silent! It was a rare experience to hear a homily teaching against contraception & abortion. It was a rare occurrence to hear a homily teaching that famous politicians and “Catholics” who supported abortion have excommunicated themselves. Now, after 40 years of killing more than 52MILLION babies in just our country, the killing of 23 innocent children opens the eyes of many. But, unfortunately, most of the talk is about guns..not about the lack of respect for life in all its stages from conception to natural death. We have a long road to go before the culture changes, but with good clergy who are not afraid to preach the truth, we may be able to reverse this culture of death!
I lived near Newtown and what happened there is horrific, a sucker punch no less ugly than what happened on 9/11, but a mentally ill young person should not be the reason to limit go after our Constitutional right to bear arms.
The person who does this type of heinous crime, makes their intentions known; they WANT to be known, otherwise they would simply commit suicide.
We too readily shrug off the rants of people like this as silly, or just being dramatic or or or. If we do report it, the police are handcuffed. They can do nothing until a crime is committed. In most states, it is almost impossible to have someone committed, even for a 72 hour observation. These are the laws that must be changed.
Our movies are violent, video games are graphic and violent and most of all, we live in a culture that kills a million babies a year with the blessing of the law and the culture. I agree with the Bishops on the violence of culture, but let’s not put the blame on our Constitutional rights. The blame lies elsewhere.
The happenings in Newtown were not the work of a sane person who chose to do evil for some perverse reason; they were the workings of a mentally ill person who needed to be brought to the attention of the public authorities for the purpose institutionalizing him. Seeking to enact so called “gun control” laws to keep this from happening is another desperate attempt to subjugate Americans to the very public authorities who failed in protecting this man and these children and adults in the first place.
In other words, a call to restrict or abolish the Second Amendment to the US Constitution.
You can count on the USCCB to issue another one of their countless meaningless fulminations on the subject or flavor of the day….which absolutely no one reads (unless you work in a Diocesan Office) or worse yet…cares about. When “Catholics” provide the votes to first elect and then reelect a BHO then the problem is way beyond nut jobs with a semiautomatic weapons shooting up schools and theaters. The problem in this society is the long term collapse of morals greatly contributed to by the surrender of moral leadership by the Bishops of the Catholic Church represented by the USCCB. Sandy Hook is the symptom not the disease. The Bishops need to get out of DC politics, bury the “Church Nice”, put on the Armor of God, re-energize the “Church Militant” and let the Truth Rip….clearly, cheerfully, constantly, enthusiastically,and without ceasing. Their first, second and third priority should be as shepherds saving souls. Until they stop the theological PC a/k/a “social justice” mantra, they will be continued to be played by both sides and made fools of by the professional “Catholic” political class…You know them…Pelosi, Biden, Durbin et al ad infinitum. All should have been formerly and publicly excommunicated moons ago. They will not be taken seriously until they start acting like real Catholic Bishops. Fortunately, more of them are starting to do their jobs and shepherds and teachers. Hopefully, it’s not too little, too late.
Preach Christ—this is not the time for the Church to become involved in gun control. With the Church’s history of its harm to children, I would think no one would listen to such nonsense as the opinion of the Church on gun control. The Church needs to share the love of Christ. This is the only way to change our culture—not sticking the Church’s soiled nose in gun control issues. The Church has been entrusted with a great treasure—the gospel. This is the priority of the Church, one that it has failed to share miserably. Reform from within before trying to “preach” gun control.
The revolver (6 shot) has been with us for well over 100 years. No one ever walked into a class room in the 1800’s with two revolvers and killed 12 children. It’s not the guns. Yes we should have sensible legislation, many states do, but its not the guns. And would you please stop calling mean looking, high capacity rifles -assault weapons. There really is no such thing. There are mean looking and/or high capacity, but not “assault”. Use of that word only brings emotion, not logic; ignorance, not understanding.
What if the headline had read “GUN ENTHUSIAST MOTHER KILLS MENTALLY ILL SON”? Everyone would blame the mom, and would never know what could have been. Laws and policies are not the cure at this point. but the bishops could do a lot to change hearts if they tried.
The bishops are treading into waters of which they should not tread. The 2nd Amendment is a right to defend our selves and families from not only evil people but also tyrrnical gov’t etc. Any attempt to marginalize the person’s right to gun ownership via registration is wrong. Bishops would do better if they convince thier flocks to be god fearing christians who are pro-life, condem gay life styles and not socialist agendas. they have done a poor job in this regard so far. Get LCWR on track with Catholic values first…..then keep going into other theological issues.
More and more evidence is coming out that all the recent mass shootings involved several shooters and a patsy that was killed in order to make it look like a lone psycho gunman did it. For example in CT they arrested 2 more men in the woods right next to school dressed in military camouflage outfit. Those were the real shooters. The same happened in Aurora. It was all planned to have an excuse to confiscate. guns.
Patsies are normally used as decoys, deliberately inserted into the psyop to
deflect attention away from the specialist group, allowing the latter time to
extract safely from the operational area while the patsy takes the blame, But
the planners leave tell-tale signs and occasionally make critical mistakes. It
is a little-known fact that Lee Harvey Oswald was proved a patsy when a New
Zealand newspaper printed a story about his guilt several hours before he was
accused of the crime in Dallas. The planners put the decoy story on the news
wires too early, forgetting the crucial time difference would allow the New
Zealand paper to print the story long before Oswald was even accused. It was a
single planning error, but one that proved in absolute scientific terms that Lee
Harvey Oswald was deliberately set up as a patsy. And so was Adam Lanza,
James Holmes and many many others.
Why don’t they emphasize putting fathers back into families?
I must say that I was extremely disappointed in this article. The title indicated that the bishops would be speaking about the REAL ills of society, instead of “reasonable gun control, without infringing on the rights of citizens” Pure bull. Not possible.
The REAL problem is, and always has been, man’s proclivity to sin. Our culture is 85% Christian. Therefore, the secularists believe in moral relativism. That means that whatever the majority of the culture believes is moral dictates how the society is governed.
If the secularists really believe in this, why is the culture of death so prevelant. Abortion, in your face homosexuality, no fault divorce, are accepted in our society as NORMAL, and a direct violiation of the secularists core beliefs. Why is that? Simple. They don’t believe in thier own doctorine. They banter about this concept of moral relativism, but cram the opposite down the 85% Christian’s throats, forcing us to accept this evil, and if we speak out about it, we are guilty of “hate speach”, we’re narrow minded, controlling, and such. All brought about by attorneys (word smiths), that make enormous amounts of money on abiguous laws. If the laws were clear and concise, there would be no need for attorneys to have a strangle hold on society.
The ACLU and their counterparts have effectively scared the vast moral majority into just sit down, shut up, and accept what we want, or we’ll demonize you. We’ll call you haters, bigots, close minded and such.
I agre with the above that the change MUST start at the Catholic Church, and we need to shout from the treetops that we Love the sinner but HATE the sin, and therefore you cannot demonize us, as by speaking out against evil, we are really expressing a more loving attitude than those forcing us to accept the immoral minority positions.
There, that feels better. Carry on.
That’s a start every Christian Catholic & Protestant Church should also preach on bullying why? because over 70% a school shooters were bullied. Supposedly 76% of Americans consider themselves Christian only 40% go to mass/services regularly. If 76% of Americans consider themselves Christians then why do millions of kids get bullied every day? The Churchs need to get together to preach, teach in their Religious Education classes about what the bible says about how to treat others (in context with bullying)~ Eph 4:32, Col3:12, John 13:34, MT 22: 37-39, Lk 10:25-37
Foul language Eph4: 29, Col3:8
A friend of mine’s son has been bullied since the beginning of last year by other Catholic kids & Protestants. She lives in a heavy Christian area, last year her 9 year old was really upset and talking about suicide she finally got it out of him why he was talking about suicide. It was because all the kids in the same class said that they wish he was dead. The one who said it first was a Catholic girl. Can’t see why anyone would say that to him he is a really nice kid, doesn’t say mean things. He has been choked a couple of times, his head banged, tackled even though there is not supposed to be any tackling during recess, called all kind of nasty names. How they know the kids are Christian is he goes to RE at the Catholic Church with some of them and some of them went to the same Church as the teacher. The parents have talked with the principal about the bullying.My friend was bullied at the Catholic schools she went to for years, if she hadn’t been able to run really fast probably would have been beat up more often. Finally in 8th grade her teacher had a talk with the students in her class and the bullying didn’t stop fully but there was a dramatic drop in name calling, trying to jump her (to beat her up).
I know others that have been bullied by Protestants/Catholics as well. I have never heard a sermon on bullying. I have heard that we are supposed to love our neighbor but not that we should not call others names, physically hurt others ie bullying, or a sermon on using foul language. Children may not realize that what they are doing is bullying so that needs to be explained. Since 50%-60% of Christians do not go to Mass/services regularly maybe Christian radio stations can also share the message that God loves everyone NOT just the popular kids and how calling others names is calling Jesus names etc! Do this at the beginning of the school year, middle & end.
The statistics on bullying and suicide http://www.bullyingstatistics.org/content/bullying-and-suicide.html
Of all the things the Bishops could be fighting for!
1. Calling on the dpt. of education to stop indoctrinating the kids
2. Calling to the dpt. of education exploting students by permitting giant fees for universities - to indoctrinate kids - no God, no country - no parents - no respect - yes socialism - yes moral decay
3. Calling on the gov foster agencies to stop the discrimination for christian foster parents - like in CA - they don’t allow you to talk to them about God
4. Calling on the gov to stop the child abuse by allowing homosexual couples to adopt - depriving them of a mother and father to teach them values instead of perverting them
5. Calling to end the abortion industry who champions disrespect of life 6. Call to parents to care of their children instead of themselves - divorce- absent father etc etc.
CALL to stop MORAL DECAY - santified by the democratic party these days, not on our right to use arms.
To the Bishops: How many of your parishes have a ministry for single moms? None. And, by the way, the 2nd Amendment Right to Bear Arms is not primarily for target shooting and hunting. The right to gun ownership (as outlined by President Thomas Jefferson) is that the people may rise up and take their government back from tyrants and bureaucrats in office. It is a hedge that government should fear when “We the people” have more guns than our government.
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