Gun Violence

by Margery Rossi
Pastor of Stony Point Presbyterian Church, Stony Point, NY.

In January 2011, our congregation grieved along with the nation as the people of Tuscon, AZ experienced the senseless shootings of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, members of her staff, a judge, a little girl, an elderly woman and other citizens on an ordinary Saturday morning. In the following weeks, a small group met to talk about the impact of this and other gun violence on us as individuals and as church. We found through these conversations that each and every person in the group had been touched by gun violence at least once in their lives. We decided that we wanted to know more about how to faithfully engage this complex issue but did not want to engage in polarizing debate about the right to bear arms.

Religious communities and leaders are working with border activists and organizers to reduce gun violence by creating a bi-national campaign to impede the illegal flow of assault weapons, sniper rifles and high-capacity handguns into northern Mexico. When gun dealers in the southwestern U.S. turn a blind eye to the practice of “straw purchasing,” whereby stand-ins for illegal gun traffickers buy guns in bulk that end up in the arsenals of Mexican drug cartels, they are contributing to the huge numbers of weapons that flow across the border, and to the growing insecurity, injury and death in communities in northern Mexico.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) will be web streaming the plenary sessions and special events of the upcoming International Ecumenical Peace Convocation (IEPC). The video streams will be live from the Mona campus of the University of West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica, where the convocation is being held, beginning Wednesday 18 May.

Click here to view pictures from the event on Facebook

Click here for resources used during the event

from http://www.fixgunchecks.org/splash