Gun Control

[Toten]

What is the Catholic Churchs Teaching on Gun Control?

 

[Hastrman]

It doesn’t have a specific one, but it does assert the two rights a) of citizens to defend themselves and b) of governments to keep order. At the moment, because most of the hierarchy’s European, the interpretation probably tends to be in favor of restrictions on gun ownership, but it’s by no means defined dogma.

 

[Iowa_Mike]

I don’t know of any Church teaching that would prohibit gun ownership. Almost all of the arguments, pro and con, center on the social issues around the use of guns, not on religious concerns.

Iowa Mike

 

[Black_Jaque]

The Church says that if you own 'em you’d better keep 'em under control.

Hastrman sums it up very nicely.

I was dissappointed to hear that Benedict XVI gave some kudos to a group of Catholics who are advancing some line of thought that children shouldn’t play with war toys. That’s nothing more than pacifism to avoid war.

As G.K. Chesterton put it, “War is not the way to settle our differences. It is the only way to prevent them from being settled for us.”

 

[Scottgun]

The Church would regard gun control as left to the prudential judgement of governments.

Scott

 

[Iowa_Mike]

All,

Does anyone else find it interesting that gun control discussions almost always center on the ‘evil’ done with and by guns but never mention the hundreds of thousands of times each year that a gun saves a life or prevents a serious crime?

Iowa Mike

 

[Scottgun]

All,

Does anyone else find it interesting that gun control discussions almost always center on the ‘evil’ done with and by guns but never mention the hundreds of thousands of times each year that a gun saves a life or prevents a serious crime?

Iowa Mike

I remember a news piece where the reporter was talking to the officer who handled a Baltimore precint’s seized weapons storage. When asked how many of the guns in it were aquired legally, he said less than 3%. Ergo, Even with very lax gun control laws, criminals still acquire weapons through illegal channels, making gun control laws largely a burden on the law-abiding with little effect on crime.

Scott

 

[Iowa_Mike]

I remember a news piece where the reporter was talking to the officer who handled a Baltimore precint’s seized weapons storage. When asked how many of the guns in it were aquired legally, he said less than 3%. Ergo, Even with very lax gun control laws, criminals still acquire weapons through illegal channels, making gun control laws largely a burden on the law-abiding with little effect on crime.

Scott

Amen to that brother!

Iowa Mike

 

[mary_bobo]

All,

Does anyone else find it interesting that gun control discussions almost always center on the ‘evil’ done with and by guns but never mention the hundreds of thousands of times each year that a gun saves a life or prevents a serious crime?

Iowa Mike

They really don’t have another answer except to try to reinterpret the Constitution. When guns get banned, how about baseball bats, knives, cars, and on and on. I have always thought that folks who think like this just don’t know a darn thing about guns.

 

[cosine]

It doesn’t have a specific one, but it does assert the two rights a) of citizens to defend themselves and b) of governments to keep order.

Yep. However, government-enforced gun control does absolutely nothing to keep order. Gun control is a lose-lose proposition, being (here in the U.S.) unconstitutional and (everywhere) an abuse of human rights.

 

[Black_Jaque]

Another G.K. Chesterton quote that applies to this:

“Idolatry is committed, not merely by setting up false gods, but also by setting up false devils; by making men afraid of war or alcohol, or economic law, when they should be afraid of spiritual corruption and cowardice.” - ILN 9/11/09

I am convinced that if G.K. Chesterton were alive in the U.S. today he would have written “…by making men afraid of children or tobacco, or guns, …”

 

[2shelbys]

The Church would regard gun control as left to the prudential judgement of governments.

Scott

No, it should be left to the prudential judgement of the people and it must be in compliance with the Constitution, meaning the original intent of the framers, not what some leftist judge or lawyer thinks it should mean. I know that is what you meant.