How have you responded to the tragic shootings at Virginia Tech?
Being half a world away here in Australia doesn’t leave us unaffected by the actions of the gunman. Our hearts go out to the wounded and the families who have lost loved ones.
Our thoughts now turn to the security of our own families. If it could happen there it could happen to those we love. How do we protect those closest to us? Thankfully our gun laws in Australia mean that guns are not as readily available, meaning that we have far, far fewer gun deaths per capita than in the U.S. but all it takes is one gun and one person to pull the trigger.
My regular Wednesday morning guest on 98.5 Sonshine FM is Ross Clifford who is the Principal of Morling College in New South Wales and current President of the Baptist Union of Australia. Each week we chat about a range of issues relating to spirituality and belief.
Today we talked about the events at Virginia Tech, about the heroes who fought to save others, about our response to the tragedy and where God was as people’s lives were being violently ripped away from them.
You can listen to our discussion by left clicking here or you can right click here to save the mp3 and listen later.
Posted by Rodney Olsen
Technorati Tags: Virginia Tech – Shooting – Radio
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I think my thoughts have been with the parents of the shooter more than anything else. They seem to have been strangely silent since it happened.
Certainly we can pray. We must remember to pray for the parents of the shooter. Much is said and prayed for the parents of the victims. That is good. All too often anyone associated with a shooter in a case like this, is villanized. Who do they turn to in their time of grief, anger, confusion, and loss? Pray that they would find compassion and love as well.
I don’t like guns, but I don’t want to remove our constitutional rights to bear arms either.
Guns like this fellow had, would seem to fall into the category of suspicious to me. I can’t imagine why he was sold one.
According to some articles, the state of Virginia had prior received a C- grade on their gun laws. (Each state is different here).
However, considering the inner rage this fellow seemed to have, he might have managed to do something simular, like, driving his car inside the building, poison, or anything his damaged mind and imagination would have led him to do.
I mean, don’t even think if the guns were not sold to him, he might not have found another sick way.
When I led the prayers in our church today I made sure I included the victims of this week’s market bombing in Iraq as well as in the US. I think the excessive media coverage in this case runs the risk of blinding us to some of the greater horrors taking place around the world.