God Bless the Children


I've tried to sit down and write several times, but I've been so angry that it keeps turning into a raging rant against a monster who armed himself like a soldier to wage war on the most innocent among us.  Right now, I only feel hate for this man, so I will speak no more about him.

Unfortunately, these events are becoming all too common in our society, almost monthly now, someone, somewhere unleashes unprovoked hatred on innocent people.  The ultimate temper tantrum in which their only cause is to lash out and inflict as much suffering as possible in the name of themselves.  As despicable as the actions of terrorists are, at least they have a cause of some sort that is bigger than themselves.  They conduct their treachery in the name of a nation or a belief, but to the American lone shooter, there is nothing bigger than themselves.  It is the ultimate act of narcissism.

Every time this happens, the questions always begin asking how can we prevent this stuff.  The fact is we can't.  These people are out there and when they decide to begin their rampage, we can only react as swiftly as possible to try to stop them.  The question I would like to pose is not how to prevent this but how to react to it.  The source of this type of demented thinking is the highest level of selfishness.  So to combat that, I want to strive to live with the highest level of selflessness that I can.  I want to battle this hate with love.  I want to try to inflict as much love on this world as I can.  I want to love as much as these guys hate.

I'm not so naive to think that love will prevent this stuff, or that rainbows and flying unicorns will appear.  But I refuse to set another foot down the road of selfishness these guys have walked.  I want to become as opposite from them as I possibly can.  Out of love, I will strive to reach out to those that I can with kindness, family, friend, neighbor, and even enemy.  We can't respond with apathy and continue about our day, we must love harder to all with whom we come in contact.

But, I also believe that we need to be ready at all times to do what we can to stop such an event should it start in our presence.  "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends."  We owe it to the innocent around us to always be ready to do our absolute best to stop a rampage should we be in the presence of one.  Those who would harm children must know that should they do so in our presence, they will have the fight of their lives on their hands as out of love for the innocent we must respond with absolute tenacity until the threat is gone.  Once that happens, we must return as quickly as possible back to love.

Most of us are good at either loving or fighting, unfortunately we still live in a world where we need to be able to do both.  




Comments

  1. Thank you for this, Will! I totally agree!

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