Another school shooting. Seven miles from Columbine. They recently observed the 20th anniversary of the school shooting that seemed to change everything. Copycat killers, looking for moments of notoriety, sprung up everywhere, it seems.

What is causing all this? I have my theories. Personally, I think things started taking a giant slide down a slippery slope when Dr. Spock said don’t spank your kids. I’m not for violence by any means, but my kids got a proper swat on their butts when they were out of line. And they are great adults. 

Kids aren’t given outlets for their anger anymore. I was talking with my son-in-law’s mom last night. Her mother was discussing this with her contemporaries in the assisted living center at supper. She said, in her day and age, there were bullies, and kids got in scraps, but you had a row and got it over with. Now, children are handled with kid gloves and they can’t fight back. 

They also get left with video games and the internet as their babysitters. You cannot tell me that violent video games don’t have an impact on children today. How can it not? You can’t sit for hours at a time, shooting and maiming “people” in this realistic scenarios and not be desensitized to the violence. It becomes the norm.

This one hit close to home. While not in my daughter’s district, she teaches at a STEM school and my granddaughter is a student at that same school. (Not the one where the shooting occurred yesterday, thank God.) She used to work with many of the teachers at the school where the shooting occurred. The principal is my daughter’s sister-in-law’s best friend. 

This is getting too close. 

They’re ALL too close!

Something has to be done. Our children go into a war zone every single day. Teachers and school staff, too. This is not the country we were raised in. It’s not the country my children were raised in either. I own guns. But my guns are locked up in a safe. I have a .22 hidden when I am at the farm in case I’m bothered by a two-legged varmint.

I pray. I pray a lot. But, something has to be done. Our children are killing and being killed. Prayers are wonderful…but we need more. I’m not writing this to invite debate. This is not the place for that. There are better places for that…like with our representatives. I’m just crying out as a Nana. A very, very concerned Nana.

As an aside…I arrived at the campground without incident. 

I pray for those families. The ones who got the call. And for the families of the shooters. how horrifying.

???

“For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous.

 

We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.”

 

1 John 3:11-12, 14-15 ESV