“… they shall beat their swords into ploughshares,
and their spears into pruning-hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more;”
Micah 4:3
My daughter Claire, a high school senior, came home from school on Valentine’s Day deeply troubled. “What’s the matter, sweetheart?” “During third period my friends and I realized today was the first anniversary of the Parkland shooting and that we were the same age as the students who were killed.” On February 14, 2018, a gunman opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, killing seventeen students and staff members and injuring seventeen others. It was
the deadliest shooting at a high school in U.S. history.
Claire was in the sixth grade when the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred, on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut–the deadliest mass shooting at a grade school.
Claire’s middle and high school years have been framed–and marred–by horrific gun violence. A generation of students going to school in fear. Lockdowns commonplace across the land. Claire reports that the sudden opening of a classroom door (usually a youth returning from the bathroom) can elicit anxiety on the part of student and teacher alike. Especially following a mass shooting.
On March 24th we will observe Gun Violence Awareness Sunday at Dayspring. It is the first anniversary of “March for Our Lives,” the youth-led event that brought together hundreds of thousands of people of all ages at hundreds of sites across the U.S. Over fifty Dayspring members marched, led by a dozen of our youth. “My backpack IS NOT a bullseye,” read the sign Claire made and carried that day. This March 24th, Shane Claiborne will preach at both services and a 2:00pm event featuring Claiborne and Michael Martin, co-authors of Beating Guns: Hope for a People Who Are Weary of Violence. I’m looking for some hope. I know Claire is. How about you?
Pastor Jeff