I've always thought it ironic that the people who most demand guns as protection are the ones who claim to be good Christians.
We're taught in Sunday School that vengeance is God's, that God will provide and God will protect us.
He spared no one, not his mother, not his grandparents, not the children, not even the family dogs.
Investigators following the 24-mile trail of death through southern Alabama are still trying to determine what set Michael McLendon on a murderous shooting rampage that led to the deaths of 11 people, including himself.
"He cleaned his family out," Coffee County coroner Robert Preachers said. "We don't know what triggered it."
Savage attack, to be sure, and likely we'll never fully understand what drove him to madness. But there's a clue in the fact that this happened in the Deep South, where people are, how to put this?, a little less flexible in their tolerance of unconformity, of difference.
I chalk it up to God. Not my God, my Jesus, who preaches tolerance and love, but the God of "great vengeance and furious anger" and who commands fear, not respect, abasement, not humility.
The God of the South, altho in truth, He can be found anywhere Christians gather.
You know, it's funny, but the right wing warns all the time about the murderous Muslims and the Koranic calls to wipe out the infidels, conveniently forgetting that the God they worship actually did that once. You might recall the story of Noah. And while He left his covenant never to do that again, the rainbow, that's no guarantee that he won't do everything short of wiping life off the face of the earth.
I wonder why conservative Christians forget that little bit when raging about Muslim jihads?
It is an angry God, this God of the South. I wonder why? After all, if there was to be anyplace that would be considered "godly" in this country, it would be down there, if you believe the God of the South is the one true god.
Which of course, he clearly isnt, else why is such iniquity and pain dealt with such fierce regularity upon the people of the South?
Obviously, I write all this tongue in cheek. God has nothing to do with the deranged mind of a serial killer who has released his own furious anger upon what he perceived as iniquities. Indeed, I suspect before the day is out, a significant number of right wingers will be painting this madman as a liberal.
Which of course, he wasn't. Probably. I don't know, but I think I'm on pretty firm ground here.
What is it, tho, about the right wing, particularly the extreme right wing, that leads them so easily to violence? After all, with the exception of perhaps the Basque Separatists and maybe the extreme "Real IRA", no one from the left ever feels compelled to go on mass murder rampages.
We understand that society has rules and regulations and try to abide by them, even if the short term price is to watch our country be dismantled by thieves and robber barons. Believe me, if ANYTHING could have provoked me to violence, it was watching 8 years of a bush presidency.
So folks, discuss: what makes the right wing go ballistic? Literally?
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