When Guns Become Idols

Watch the video of Jim Atwood delivering this sermon at the Stony Point Peacemaking Colloquium.

Also titled THE IDOLS OF POWER AND THE TOOLS OF VIOLENCE.

Preached at Stony Point Peacemaking Colloquium, "Gun Violence and Gospel Values"

by James E. Atwood

I’d like to expand on my contention that guns in America have become idols. I define America’s idolatry with guns as an aggressive belief system dedicated to the expansion of gun ownership which encourages people to take their guns to the workplace, college campuses, public schools, libraries, national parks, churches and bars. This belief system is enhanced by an attitude which overtly and subtly proclaims that safety and security come through guns. My friend, Rev. Rachel Smith calls this phenomenon “Gundamentalism” Although claiming the highest of social values, the belief system itself requires continuous deception and the distortion of the truth in order to minimize or ignore the 30,000 people who are killed by guns every year.

First, I believe guns have become idols in America because many people give them sacred status. Warren Cassidy, former NRA executive said, “You would get a far better understanding of the NRA if you approached us as if you were approaching one of the great religions of the world.”

In 1998, when Charlton Heston, President of the NRA, was given an antique musket, he mused, “Sacred stuff resides in that wooden stock and blue steel when ordinary hands can possess such an extraordinary instrument.”

During the 2000 presidential election campaign Heston repeated those same words and dramatically raising the musket over his head, added, “I must say those fighting words especially for you, Mr. Gore. . . from my cold dead hands!” Thousands stood and roared their approval.

It has been suggested that the decline in Biblical understanding in the US leaves an open door for the idols of power and the tools of violence to place a blasphemous Christian veneer on their policies. This religious veneer increases their power to deceive. Richard Schaull observes that the only way those who practice idolatry have to meet the challenges of God in the Bible is to take the very things God calls into question and make gods of them, ascribing to them a sacred status of their own. As stated in their creedal affirmation, “Having a gun is a God-given right.”

Not only do gun zealots use the language of the Bible, they also co-opt some of our nation’s most honored concepts and symbols. They are the “real patriots”, present day “Minutemen” who defend “freedom” and “fight crime.” They live out the “traditional American Way of Life” and praise “our founding fathers” who wrote “the Second Amendment”. They are dedicated evangelists who lobby not only in Washington but at the United Nations promoting a “Second Amendment” for all the nations of the world. And that is literal.

Secondly, America’s idolatry with guns is reinforced both consciously and subconsciously by a special learned vocabulary which employs dozens of violent words and idioms related to guns and killing. This vocabulary is not primarily for military boot camps or battlefields, or by “tough guys” or “macho types.” Even around these tables we cannot communicate without using some of these idioms. Just to illustrate the point: He thinks he’s a big shot. I don’t know if he can do the job, he’s a little gun shy. The police found the smoking gun and arrested the hit and run driver. I bought his argument, lock, stock, and barrel. He’s not a good campaigner. He’s a little trigger happy and often shoots himself in the foot. Who will we target in our financial campaign? Her diving from the 10 meter platform just blew the judges away. And the one I hate the most: “Go down to the third bullet on the page.” A list of over 130 terms will be made available for anyone who wants it.

I’m told that British English and Spanish use only a few such violent terms or idioms in their everyday conversations. Listen to the letter I received this month from a French educator. “I just got back from France where I asked my relatives and friends about daily conversation phrases that would include gun related language but we did not come up with much. She gave two examples. When I was telling folks about the American English expressions you mentioned, everyone would shake their head in disbelief and then the conversation would immediately discuss Columbine or VA Tech and they would ask "why do Americans feel like they need guns?"

We’ve all heard that one’s language reflects the basic values of one’s society. If that is true, we might ask, why Americans need more guns than citizens of any other country in the world? Where does this insatiable appetite come from?

Why does a civilized society need ever more powerful bullets to penetrate the protective vests of the police? Why do law abiding gun owners need silencers? Why is the Barrett Manufacturing Company able to advertise to the public that a round from its 50 caliber rifle is capable of bringing down an airliner? How can they get away with that? Why do we let them get away with that? Do these “needs” stem from the language we learn as small children? I wonder about that. And I must, at the very least pose a question or two.

Another reason guns have become idols is because their owners believe they can provide more than they can possibly deliver. The Apostle Paul boasts that Almighty God, “who by the power at work within us is able to do far more abundantly than all that we can ask or think.” (Eph. 3:20). That is not the case with idols.

Jesus instructs us “to give and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over will be put into your lap. For the measure you give will be given to you.” Luke 6:37-38

The New Testament teaches us that with God there is always more. But, with an idol there is always less. That’s a dilemma for idols. People expect too much of them.

We all know persons who acquire more and more things and expect joy and happiness in return. But, the mournful cry heard throughout suburbia is, “I love my life style but I’m not happy.” More and more things cannot bring joy.

Again, consider America’s overwhelming military superiority. We use smart bombs, predator drones, and the most sophisticated of weapons systems; we intimidate enemies with 10,000 nuclear bombs; we spend $12 billion a month on our wars,3 but the national security we really want is increasingly elusive and we live in constant fear.

Likewise, possessing the most powerful handguns and assault weapons cannot bring peace of mind to their owners. I’ve observed that those who carry these weapons are the most nervous and fearful people of all? The security they promise is illusory while the concept of security itself in this world is the biggest con job of all.

Again, as with all idols, their greatest strength is in their ability to deceive and this deception leads to the breakdown of human community. This deception and its attendant violence go hand in hand. Every day we are advised of the dangers posed by persons who differ from us in race, class, language, nation, and religion. We are carefully taught to hate or at the lease suspicion those who are different. In my 74 years I have repeatedly seen the numbers of aircraft, submarines, and carriers, as well as semi-automatic handguns increase according to the levels of fear which are generated in the public mind by the idols of worldly power. Whether the enemy is real or perceived, the effect is the same. As fear of enemies or potential enemies mounts, so does the number of weapons of all kinds.

Idols thrive on enemies. They cannot get enough of them. They always require more. The idols of power employ thousands of men and women who make their livings by imagining and informing people of new and dangerous enemies. The idols sow seeds of suspicion, fear and hatred that will probably sprout into violence sometime, somehow, somewhere. And oftentimes those enemies are not really there.

Yesterday upon the stair, I met a man who wasn’t there. He wasn’t there again today. I wish that man would go away. –Nursery Rhyme
Meanwhile, the idol’s carefully crafted fears drive people to the gun store and gun zealots are happy to keep the crazy rumors alive on the internet and on talk shows. It’s great for business.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn said in his Nobel acceptance speech, “Let us not forget that violence does not exist by itself and cannot do so; it is necessarily interwoven with lies. Violence finds its only refuge in falsehood. One who once acclaims violence as his method must choose falsehood as his principle.”

Another reason guns are idols is what they do to the spirits of those who trust them. The Apostle Paul wrote, “If anyone is in Christ, she is a new creation; The old has passed away, behold, the new has come.” II Cor.5:17. The fruits of God’s spirit become visible in the new believer’s life: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The believer looks for ways to express these wonderful gifts of God which bring life, health and peace to communities. (Gal. 5:22-23)

A conversion also takes place in one who believes that a weapon will save and protect her from harm. She too becomes a “new creation” and grows to be like the idol itself. Yes, the idol is a thing, but it is a thing with a spirit. If you love mercy, seek justice and want to walk humbly with God, you will grow to be like God. If you look to the tools of violence for deliverance, you will grow to be like them. Listen to the Psalmist, “Those who make idols are like them; so are all who trust in them.” Psalm 115:8

Trusting a gun for one’s security sets loose convictions of extraordinary power and turns a person inside out and upside down. Calm reason and clarity of vision are not part of this process. With a 9mm semi-automatic gun in your hand, no longer are you just a little someone; you are the creator of a world of your own choosing. No longer are you controlled; you are in control. No longer are you weak and vulnerable; you are strong. No longer are you afraid; you are powerful beyond your wildest dreams. No longer must you take orders; you will give orders. No longer will you be bullied; you can make your tormentors pay, big time. Whenever human beings reach the point where they trust anyone or anything more than Almighty God they become something less than human.

Another reason guns are idols is because they require human sacrifice. And once violence is recommended and glorified, how quickly the perpetrators start claiming that right which belongs only to God. . . deciding who will live tomorrow and who will die today.
In wartime we expect the gruesome deaths of military personnel. We also expect many women, children and the elderly to die because they will be in the wrong place at the wrong time. We call their deaths, “collateral damage.” We deeply regret them, but nations will never win wars if they worry too much about collateral damage. Violence is never, ever fully in control.

Or again, in the heat of battle, as combatants use every conceivable technological advantage to kill or be killed, mistakes will be made and we will kill our friends and allies and, in turn, be killed by them. We call that “friendly fire.” These are harsh, yet accepted realities of warfare where human life is offered to the idols of power.
But, what term do we use to describe America’s peacetime deaths by guns which ironically are far more numerous than wartime deaths? What do you call deaths that could have been prevented, or avoided, or at the very least, significantly reduced? The only adequate term is human sacrifice.
The dictionary defines a sacrifice as the forfeiture of something highly valued for the sake of someone or something that is considered to have an even greater value. Human sacrifice is the forfeiture of life for an even nobler cause. In America, that more noble cause is the idol of gun rights.

Our country is quite vocal in criticizing China and other nation’s human rights abuses. Nevertheless, when 30,000 Americans are buried each year because of guns, it means that each of those 30,000 people has been denied his or her ultimate human right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Those human rights abuses are what we pay to keep the idol of gun rights on its throne, unexamined, unquestioned, unchallenged and unchecked. In America today human sacrifice is expected and demanded.

I could not have continued to work in this field for these 33 years without my faith in God who will one day call a halt to the idols of power and the tools of violence. Their defeat will occur as Christians use God’s nonviolent tools of love. Love is the most powerful change agent in the world. Christian love is the greatest gift we can offer our country.

Christian love must challenge the deception and lies of the gun lobby. Love cannot accept the lie that guns which kill can provide safety and security. Christian love cannot accept the lie that guns can bring peace. Christian love also means telling the truth, even when it is uncomfortable to do so, even when one is mocked. The stakes of softening the truth are much too high.

To love people in God’s name is to engage even those in our Christian
Community who believe that more guns will provide security. We know that a gun in the house is 22 times more likely to result in a death in one’s household in a domestic dispute, by accidental death or an injury, in domestic violence or to be stolen and used in a violent crime than to be against an intruder.
It should give comfort to all of us in knowing that most Americans agree that there needs to be stronger gun regulations. Did you hear that? Even in Southwest Virginia most people agree with that.

But we in the Christian church also have an idol. It is called sentimentality. We have let Christian love morph into sentimentality and warm comfy feelings. I have seen scores of pastors and elders and deacons be deceived into believing that Christian fellowship is best expressed when all the members are happy; and to accomplish that level of sentimentality difficult or complex subjects are avoided at all costs so that no one is greatly disturbed.

Because the church has been virtually silent before the slaughter of thousands who die by guns, we have forfeited our moral authority, and unintentionally we have perpetuated the very violence we abhor.
Yet, before the church can even think about the redemptive and pro-active Christian witness we can make in our communities against gun violence, we must first talk honestly about it in church. We must insist that it be addressed from the pulpit, the classroom and in the fellowship hall.

In closing, I believe the church must recognize two things: 1. That those for whom guns are idols, comprise a very small percentage of the membership of local Presbyterian churches. When most Americans favor more stringent controls over who gets guns and when, it is safe to conclude that the vast majority of almost every Presbyterian congregation is supportive of keeping guns out of the hands of children, the mentally ill, and violent people. Its not as risky as some would like you to believe to stick your neck out.

Secondly, the church must acknowledge that it is a denial of Christian love and Christian faith when sessions and congregations permit one or two or a few disgruntled folk for whom guns are idols to hold the entire church hostage from discussing gun violence and taking actions that would save lives. To be held hostage and to refuse to confront death and destruction is not Christian love; neither is it Christian fellowship. It is serving an idol called sentimentality.

I can hear, the gun zealots creed even now, “But, guns save Lives.” I can also hear the FBI reply, “Yes, you’re right. In 2005, there were 143 justifiable homicides where guns were known to have saved lives. We have documentation for that. We also have documentation that guns were responsible for 12,352 murders, 17,002 suicides, and 789 accidental deaths in 2005. 4. The church must find ways to help our country do the math.