Why is prolife weak in preserving one's own right to life and seem to disfavor the right to bear arms?

[Lou_F]

Why do prolife Catholics give only partial support for life? Why are prolife Catholics bias and choose to defend life in some areas but refuse to defend life in other areas where the Church Herself defends life? I know ending abortion and euthanasia is a major priority, but what about other innocent lives? Is not all human life precious? Catholics make the defenseless a top priority in the defense of human life but do they really? Do they really defend all the defenseless with the same important amount of vigor required in order to help ALL innocent human life? What is the problem here? Are we worried what others may think? If we are all called to be courageous in the defense of ALL innocent human life, Catholic prolife groups (with all due respect for what they already do) have more work to do. Such neglect or maybe even such cowardice to do so may have a horrific result at the time of the next presidential election or any election.
Evil will not cease to exist on earth until Christ’s return in glory. Does that not mean that all innocent human lives need to be protected until then? We must compare one’s individual right to bear arms to one’s nation’s right to have an armed military and even armed police departments. Just as peaceful nations have the God given right to defend themselves against an aggressor as in the case in WW2, or terrorism, does not the fabric of society, the family, also have that right to defend her loved ones at a smaller, but just as destructive scale? The Church accepts the individual right to self-defense even if the aggressor has to be dealt a lethal blow, in other words, even if a gun is used to defend one’s innocent life. (See 2264 & 2265 in the Catechism) So too is the case for those who are responsible for the lives of others, as a parent their children.
Live by the sword, die by the sword? The Lord wasn’t refering to those who just want to defend their family or their own lives. They don’t LIVE by the sword. Are not those who LIVE by the sword those who use it as a way of life contrary to God’s peace and justice? Are we not both pro-peace AND pro-justice? God’s peace and justice are not opposed to each other, they are both equally needed in a world where evil exists. Life is a battle. Pro-life is a battle. Life is a spiritual battle against the flesh. It is a physical battle to stay healthy and exercise. It is a mental battle to make and discern the right decisions concerning life. Unfortunately in our evil world, justice and the defense of the innocent has to exist when evil men reject the path to peace. Gun control is not the answer as long as evil continues to exist. Should we not be ashamed to emphasize the right to life in some areas and cowardly reject or ignore the right to life in other areas? Everbody wants peace, but when are we going to acknowlege that peace will not come until Christ returns? Is not thinking that peace will come before then a presumption that man can do things by their own strength? Is not thinking that peace will come before then a rejection of God’s Word in Revelation Chp 21? Where a group of individual lives will be saved due to gun-control, we cannot be hypocritical and ignore the different group of lives that will be lost due to gun-control. Should not prolife groups advocate with great fortitude a need for harsher penalties in the legal systen as a mericiful way of saving innocent life? Should not prolife groups advocate with great fortitude the justice in accordance with God’s law for an individual to preserve his own right to life and the lives he or she is responsible for with the use of a gun? What organization greater than life should represent a life issue?
If we don’t start emphasizing the right people have in accordance with God’s law to bear arms, elections may be lost due to ignorance. People who have their hearts in the right place need to be made aware of the right to bear arms so their deciding vote will not alter the outcome of an election in an unfavorable way. Martin Luther King Jr. once said: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” We cannot be cowards when speaking the whole Truth.

 

[dmelosi]

Why do prolife Catholics give only partial support for life? Why are prolife Catholics bias and choose to defend life in some areas but refuse to defend life in other areas where the Church Herself defends life? I know ending abortion and euthanasia is a major priority, but what about other innocent lives? Is not all human life precious? Catholics make the defenseless a top priority in the defense of human life but do they really? Do they really defend all the defenseless with the same important amount of vigor required in order to help ALL innocent human life? What is the problem here? Are we worried what others may think? If we are all called to be courageous in the defense of ALL innocent human life, Catholic prolife groups (with all due respect for what they already do) have more work to do. Such neglect or maybe even such cowardice to do so may have a horrific result at the time of the next presidential election or any election.
Evil will not cease to exist on earth until Christ’s return in glory. Does that not mean that all innocent human lives need to be protected until then? We must compare one’s individual right to bear arms to one’s nation’s right to have an armed military and even armed police departments. Just as peaceful nations have the God given right to defend themselves against an aggressor as in the case in WW2, or terrorism, does not the fabric of society, the family, also have that right to defend her loved ones at a smaller, but just as destructive scale? The Church accepts the individual right to self-defense even if the aggressor has to be dealt a lethal blow, in other words, even if a gun is used to defend one’s innocent life. (See 2264 & 2265 in the Catechism) So too is the case for those who are responsible for the lives of others, as a parent their children.
Live by the sword, die by the sword? The Lord wasn’t refering to those who just want to defend their family or their own lives. They don’t LIVE by the sword. Are not those who LIVE by the sword those who use it as a way of life contrary to God’s peace and justice? Are we not both pro-peace AND pro-justice? God’s peace and justice are not opposed to each other, they are both equally needed in a world where evil exists. Life is a battle. Pro-life is a battle. Life is a spiritual battle against the flesh. It is a physical battle to stay healthy and exercise. It is a mental battle to make and discern the right decisions concerning life. Unfortunately in our evil world, justice and the defense of the innocent has to exist when evil men reject the path to peace. Gun control is not the answer as long as evil continues to exist. Should we not be ashamed to emphasize the right to life in some areas and cowardly reject or ignore the right to life in other areas? Everbody wants peace, but when are we going to acknowlege that peace will not come until Christ returns? Is not thinking that peace will come before then a presumption that man can do things by their own strength? Is not thinking that peace will come before then a rejection of God’s Word in Revelation Chp 21? Where a group of individual lives will be saved due to gun-control, we cannot be hypocritical and ignore the different group of lives that will be lost due to gun-control. Should not prolife groups advocate with great fortitude a need for harsher penalties in the legal systen as a mericiful way of saving innocent life? Should not prolife groups advocate with great fortitude the justice in accordance with God’s law for an individual to preserve his own right to life and the lives he or she is responsible for with the use of a gun? What organization greater than life should represent a life issue?
If we don’t start emphasizing the right people have in accordance with God’s law to bear arms, elections may be lost due to ignorance. People who have their hearts in the right place need to be made aware of the right to bear arms so their deciding vote will not alter the outcome of an election in an unfavorable way. Martin Luther King Jr. once said: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” We cannot be cowards when speaking the whole Truth.

You generalize too much that all pro lifers are also in favor of gun control.

Are you prolife?

 

[vern_humphrey]

Many who claim to be pro-life are quite equivocal about it – and will often vote for pro-choice politicians whom they see as favoring certain programs they like.

It’s our calling to show them that pro-life is the only position a Catholic can take, and it must be taken unequivocally – and that includes both the right to self defense and the right to possess the means of self defense.

 

[melensdad]

Where there are a lot of generalities thrown around about PRO-LIFE people let us more simply list them.

“Pro-Life” should also:

• equal opposition to the death penalty
• equal pro-self defense (at least modestly pro-gun)
• equal opposition to mercy killing ~ euthanasia
• equal pro-foreign intervention against genocide (why are we not in Darfur?)
• equal opposition to an Iraq pull out of our troops
  How many Catholics want us out of Iraq RIGHT NOW? I suspect that there are MANY Catholics who will vote for candidates that will try to pull us out of Iraq. If that happens there will be GENOCIDE on a grand scale and the Pope himself does not want the US forces out of Iraq. In fact in his recent meetings between the Pope and George Bush, it was made clear to the President that we can NOT pull our troops out until there is a STABLE government and police force in place. To pull out of Iraq now will likely cause a Turkish invasion of the Kurdish area of Iraq with genocide against the Kurds and an expansion of the Turkish lands. The Iranian government will send troops in and there will be a Shiite / Sunni war leaving one group dead. Saudi Arabia will join in on the Iranian side (Iran & Saudi Arabia are the same religion). Generally there will be massive unrest and far more war. But many here ignore those facts and just want our troops out. I never wanted our troops to go in, but now that they are there, they must stay until the job is completed.

We also should be in favor of sending troops INTO the Darfur region of the Sudan to stop the genocide that the UN has estimated to be between 200,000 and 400,000 deaths.

We also should demand the US pull out of the United Nations because of its Pro-Abortion stance. In fact the UN and the European Union are both pressuring Nicoragua to fund abortions and both the EU and the UN are threatening to cut off humanitarian/financial aid if abortions are NOT PAID FOR by that Central American nation.

 

[mary_bobo]

You generalize too much that all pro lifers are also in favor of gun control.

Are you prolife?

Agree. I am pro-life, having worked gratis for four years for a Pro-Life Pac. And I am for second amendment rights. I have a carry permit and go out to the range once a week to practice. I am a bit of a perfectionist and I like to see if I can do better every time I go. Also life member of NRA. I strongly think you can be both.

 

[FightingFat]

I think being pro-life and pro-gun are mutually exclusive positions.

 

[vern_humphrey]

I think being pro-life and pro-gun are mutually exclusive positions.

The right to self-defense is inherent in the right to life, which means we have a right to have the most effective means of self-defense.

 

[Sr_Sally]

My take on all this is that here in the USA we are at very little risk of coming up against an armed assailant. Yes, you hear about it in the news, but usually because it is so sensational. However, people who live in houses with guns are at a much higher risk of being injured or dying from a gunshot. Usually it is children playing with guns. I’m sure you keep yours safely locked up and unloaded, but many many do not. How is it protecting the innocent, for young children to be maimed or killed with their parent’s guns?

On the other hand, in the USA there is a huge carnage going on with abortion. Deliberate killing of children who haven’t even committed a venial sin!

I have a limited amount of time and money to devote to a cause. For me it makes MUCH more sense to do something about abortion than to worry about gun control.

 

[vern_humphrey]

My take on all this is that here in the USA we are at very little risk of coming up against an armed assailant. Yes, you hear about it in the news, but usually because it is so sensational. However, people who live in houses with guns are at a much higher risk of being injured or dying from a gunshot. Usually it is children playing with guns. I’m sure you keep yours safely locked up and unloaded, but many many do not. How is it protecting the innocent, for young children to be maimed or killed with their parent’s guns?

That is not true.

Accidental deaths from gunshot wounds are so infrequent that they would not be carried as a separate category in national statistics if it weren’t a political issue.

If you want to save children from accidental deaths – outlaw swimming pools and 5-gallon buckets. Far more children drown than die from gunshots.

On the other hand, in the USA there is a huge carnage going on with abortion. Deliberate killing of children who haven’t even committed a venial sin!

I have a limited amount of time and money to devote to a cause. For me it makes MUCH more sense to do something about abortion than to worry about gun control.

That is true – even swimming pools and 5-gallon buckets doen’t kill so many little ones.

 

[Sr_Sally]

That is not true.

Accidental deaths from gunshot wounds are so infrequent that they would not be carried as a separate category in national statistics if it weren’t a political issue.

If you want to save children from accidental deaths – outlaw swimming pools and 5-gallon buckets. Far more children drown than die from gunshots.

That is true – even swimming pools and 5-gallon buckets doen’t kill so many little ones.

I wasn’t saying that accidental gunshots were a leading cause of death. Simply that children living in a home with guns have a higher chance of getting hurt by a gun than those that don’t.

 

[vern_humphrey]

I wasn’t saying that accidental gunshots were a leading cause of death. Simply that children living in a home with guns have a higher chance of getting hurt by a gun than those that don’t.

But a much lower chance of dying accidentally than those living in (or near) homes that have swimming pools, 5-gallon buckets, cleaning solvents, or medicine cabinets.

 

[Sir_Knight]

I wasn’t saying that accidental gunshots were a leading cause of death. Simply that children living in a home with guns have a higher chance of getting hurt by a gun than those that don’t.

According to the U.S. Justice Department’s “Urban Delinquency and Substance Abuse” report …

• 0% of children that get guns from their parents commit gun-related crimes while 21% of those that get them illegally do.
• Over three times as many children (41%) take drugs if they also obtain guns illegally, as compared to cjhildren given guns by their parents (13%)

 

[Ilroy]

I wasn’t saying that accidental gunshots were a leading cause of death. Simply that children living in a home with guns have a higher chance of getting hurt by a gun than those that don’t.

I don’t buy that claim either.
Children who live in a home with guns are generally taught proper gun safety and have a healthy respect for what can be done with a gun.
Children living in homes without guns are generally sheltered form guns and taught nothing about them except that they are evil and shouldn’t be owned by anyone. All this accomplishes is to make them more curious about guns and if they come across one, they handle it improperly since thye have never been given proper training. THIS is when children are hurt by themselves while handling guns improperly.

 

[Sr_Sally]

My last post on this topic. I still believe that abortion is a MUCH larger problem and deserves much more of our attention.

**What do we know about kids and gun accidents and suicides? **
When researchers studied the 30,000 accidental gun deaths of Americans of all ages that occurred between 1979-1997, they found that preschoolers aged 0-4 were 17 times more likely to die from a gun accident in the 4 states with the most guns versus the 4 states with the least guns. Likewise, school kids aged 5-14 were over 13 times more at risk of accidental firearm death in the states with high gun ownership rates. The findings indicate that gun availability is associated with accidental death by shooting [4].

Most guns involved in self-inflicted and unintentional firearm injuries (that is, in suicides and accidents) came either from the victim’s home or the home of a friend or relative [5].

med.umich.edu/1libr/yourchild/guns.htm

 

[vern_humphrey]

My last post on this topic. I still believe that abortion is a MUCH larger problem and deserves much more of our attention.

med.umich.edu/1libr/yourchild/guns.htm

This study is well-known and is usually cited as an example of how to do a study bass-ackwards. Note they started with suicides, not with a random population sample – so it doesn’t tell you anything about rates, suicides without guns, and so on.

 

[Ender]

It seems that the pro-life ideal has come to mean never taking anyone’s life under any circumstances, which is why some people are anti-gun, anti-war, and anti-death penalty. My own view is that innocent life needs to be protected, therefore the true pro-life position should support those things that provide that protection - which includes just wars, effective personal defense, and the death penalty. It is not just to treat the offender and the victim equally; the victim deserves protection by whatever (just) means are necessary even if that costs the offender his life.

Ender

 

[Bennie_P]

If we don’t start emphasizing the right people have in accordance with God’s law to bear arms, elections may be lost due to ignorance. People who have their hearts in the right place need to be made aware of the right to bear arms so their deciding vote will not alter the outcome of an election in an unfavorable way. Martin Luther King Jr. once said: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” We cannot be cowards when speaking the whole Truth.

I missed that Law is in Louviticus?

Nevertheless, it is well known that small arms and light weapons are the primary weapons used in conflicts of every kind throughout the world.
Unfortunately, however**, **it is impossible to banall kinds of small arms and light weapons. “In a world marked by evil … the right of legitimate defence by means of arms exists. This right can become a serious duty for those who are responsible for the lives of others, for the common good of the family or of the civil community. This right alone can justify the possession or transfer of arms”. (Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, “The International Arms Trade: an Ethical Reflection” in Origins 8 (24), 7 July 1994, p. 144).
This is not an absolute right, since there are specific conditions placed on the licitness of the production, possession and acquisition of arms.

Though we may have the duty to self -defense, the right to bear arms in not an absolute right. Your mixing your Catholicism with Americanism.

1 Sam 17:45 - 47 And David said to the Philistine: Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, which thou hast defied This day, and the Lord will deliver thee into my hand, and I will slay thee, and take away thy head from thee: and I will give the carcasses of the army of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air, and to the beasts of the earth: that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel. And all this assembly shall know that the Lord saveth not with sword and spear: for it is his battle, and He will deliver you into our hands.

Psalm 91:2

He shall say to the Lord: Thou art my protector, and my refuge: my God, in him will I trust.

I am pro-life 100 %, though I do not oppose gun ownership, I do think the right to bear arms may be and should be regulated.

 

[Sir_Knight]

Though we may have the duty to self -defense, the right to bear arms in not an absolute right.

And how do we perform our duty to self defense if we are denied the means by which to do it?

I am pro-life 100 %, though I do not oppose gun ownership, I do think the right to bear arms may be and should be regulated.

Regulated by whom and by what standards? What may be considered reasonable by some, may be considered unacceptable by others.

Also, a RIGHT that is REGULATED, is no longer a RIGHT because once you start ‘chipping away’ at a RIGHT, it becomes easy to lose most, or all, of it and then you are left with no means to perform your DUTY.

 

[Bennie_P]

And how do we perform our duty to self defense if we are denied the means by which to do it?

Regulated by whom and by what standards? What may be considered reasonable by some, may be considered unacceptable by others.

Also, a RIGHT that is REGULATED, is no longer a RIGHT because once you start ‘chipping away’ at a RIGHT, it becomes easy to lose most, or all, of it and then you are left with no means to perform your DUTY.

Come on…, admit it, your Lou_F, Right?

Light ‘n’ up and Just Jesus.

**Psalm 91:2 He shall say to the Lord: Thou art my protector, and my refuge: my God, in him will I trust. **

 

[Bennie_P]

And how do we perform our duty to self defense if we are denied the means by which to do it?

Regulated by whom and by what standards? What may be considered reasonable by some, may be considered unacceptable by others.

Also, a RIGHT that is REGULATED, is no longer a RIGHT because once you start ‘chipping away’ at a RIGHT, it becomes easy to lose most, or all, of it and then you are left with no means to perform your DUTY.

Come on…, admit it, your Lou_F, Right?

Light ‘n’ up and Just trust Jesus.

**Psalm 91:2 He shall say to the Lord: Thou art my protector, and my refuge: my God, in him will I trust. **