Searching for Solutions to Sandy Hook

By Michael Terheyden
12/23/2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

I suspect that most people view The Gospel of Life as the abortion encyclical. It is that, but it is much more

As a Catholic American and a parent, I very much want our children protected from acts of violence, but not just the horrible violence that occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary School, all acts of violence.

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KNOXVILLE, TN (Catholic Online) - As Americans around the country continue to mourn with the grieving families of the slaughtered children and adults at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, we are beginning to hear a growing cacophony of voices offering solutions to this tragedy. But if we hope to find genuine solutions, we need to recall Blessed John Paul II's great encyclical written in 1995, The Gospel of Life. In it he warns us about a culture of death enveloping the Western world, but we have not heeded his warning.

I suspect that most people view The Gospel of Life as the abortion encyclical. It is that, but it is much more. Blessed John Paul focuses heavily on abortion and other anti-life issues like euthanasia. These issues are extremely important in and of themselves, but they are important for other reasons too. Our attitude toward abortion and euthanasia is a reflection of our most fundamental beliefs and the kind of civilization we choose.

John Paul says a new cultural climate is emerging that gives crimes against life a more sinister character, and it is creating profound changes in our views about life and human relationships. He writes, "Even certain sectors of the medical profession, which by its calling is directed to the defense and care of human life, are increasingly willing to carry out these acts against the person. In this way the very nature of the medical profession is distorted and contradicted, and the dignity of those who practice it is degraded."

John Paul sees abortion and euthanasia as serious crimes, as false and disturbing perversions of mercy which arise out of a "grave moral decline." But he also notes that this moral decline reaches far beyond a mother's decision to abort her baby or a doctor's decision to end his patient's life. He says, "We are facing an immense threat to life: not only to the life of individuals but also to that of civilization itself."

This threat is rooted in the abuse of freedom. John Paul reminds us that freedom is a gift from God and given to persons so that they might use it for their fulfillment, which is made possible through "the gift of self and openness to others." But when this freedom is not linked with truth and used selfishly, "it is emptied of its original content, and its very meaning and dignity are contradicted."

In this way, John Paul says, "freedom negates and destroys itself." Thus, it leads to a serious distortion of life; it results in a loss of the true meaning of rights and human dignity; it leads to democracy contradicting itself and the rise of a "tyrant state"; and it becomes a factor leading to the destruction of others.

But the distortion and abuse of freedom, though hugely important, is not the heart of the problem for John Paul. He says the heart of the problem is "the eclipse of the sense of God and of man typical of a social and cultural climate dominated by secularism." He further says that "when the sense of God is lost, there is also a tendency to lose the sense of man and of his dignity and his life."

He goes on to say that the loss of God leads to a "practical materialism" which breeds utilitarianism and hedonism and where economics, inordinate consumerism, physical beauty, and pleasure dominate at the expense of the more profound dimensions of human existence. Thus, efficiency, functionality and usefulness replace respect, generosity and service.

As such, materialism impoverishes personal relations. Women, children, the sick, and the elderly are the first to be harmed. Human sexuality is easily exploited and trivialized, which for John Paul, "is among the principal factors which have led to contempt for new life," and suffering is seen as nothing more than an inescapable, useless burden to be avoided.

Moreover, at the service of this materialism is moral relativism. John Paul says that when man usurps the power of deciding right and wrong and life and death, he does not act as God in wisdom and love. "[Man] inevitably uses [such power] for injustice and death. It amounts to the strong over the weak and the sense of justice is lost in society." St. Thomas Aquinas writes that if human law is not in conformity with right reason, it is unjust and becomes an act of violence.

Among the cacophony of voices seeking solutions to the massacre at Sandy Hook, the loudest appear to be coming from the same people who have promoted a culture of death in the past. If their voices prevail, I would be concerned that we would not get genuine solutions but more violence and death, a different sort no doubt, but no less harmful to our children and our society.

I am referring to a kind of institutionalized violence often associated with authoritarianism. This kind of violence targets the mind, spirit and soul first then the body. We already see examples of this in our society. Some recent examples in ...

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1 - 5 of 5 Comments

Greg
4 months ago
The answer is the only one:Jesus Christ
vance
5 months ago
Michael, another spot on article. You said it all. I hope and pray that the USCCB will come alive and stand up to the Party of Death and Deceit before the Death Party puts them in handcuffs via HHS Mandate. I pray that the 52% of the Catholics who voted for Obama will wake up and realize that they are enablers of the Culture of Death.
Mathew Thankachen O.Praem
5 months ago
Congrats Michael for trying to instill the culture of life in an otherwise modern gloom's day. If Democracy is permitting to do what each wants, it would turn a " true craze of the demos" and true pan-demonic society. As the individual is more important than family, society or nation, " my life, my security, my liberty' will be more important than my neighbor. in fact, I doubt my neighbor and he becomes an enemy and a threat to my security. The Afro-Asian Nations don't have the gun culture to protect each citizen, even at the modern threat of Terrorism and Naxalism. of course, the rich are adopting ' gun license' as they are more enchanted by the West, who are industrial and corporate goons. of course, the police force cannot protect every citizen. It is impossible to check the mental health of each citizen before issuing gun license. Now ' public smoking is banned in this country'. Before, I felt very much suffocated to travel in trains and buses. But today, they might sneak and go to toilet to do the same, all the same, one feels so much liberated. Had guns not available in the home of Mr. Adam, he would have gone depressed, in his fits of anger and on the way, would have reconciled himself and sought some other plan of action. Easy access to anything whether sex, drug or fire arms are bound to be misused as man is not only" rational", but also an " animal" an apt definition by Aristotle. The lesser the development of heart and mind by neglecting spiritual, moral and religious input, the greater will be the expression of animality. Just as any disease should be treated not with mere symptoms, rather with its root, the social and spiritual malady are to be treated ' holistically'. A human being is the integrity of his body, mind and soul. If mind and soul is neglected by relegating family life, education, religious and spiritual upbringing , individual will shrink into a " emotional, passional being, devoid of ' rationality'. It would give rise for " psychiatric and mental clinics" who though the technique of " counseling" would dig out the past and vitiate the society like the gun lobbies who propagates " more guns, less crime". A society that believes in hedonism, consumerism, existentialism and ultimately individualism cannot keep away from the reign of satanic forces until the whole values system is re-generated.
Mathew Thankachen O.Praem.
Catholic
5 months ago
When the moral become a toilet moral these society not just lost human respect but you will have an economical collapse, less freedom and at the end a totalitarian government. That government will spread the hate, the fear till it collapses from its own trash.

We already went through this type of criminal governmental leadership before the 1990’s under the socialist era in Europe. This why we come to US as political and religious refugees to escape from the Marxist murders. It is scary to see the clear picture, as US taking the same turn against humanity. Especially the big corporations as they are controlling the society, trashing the human value, respect, as they murdering people without any consequences. (better if you open your eyes ASAP)
When someone forcefully tries to silence the human conscience, believe, turning against the religious institutions there you can’t talk anymore freedom.
If you didn’t notice, yet, you have no right over your own kids anymore. Many places the teachers scare to death because the kids become so dangerous and the teacher have no right either over the kids.
Today the most important is that how to kill out from the kids the last drop of religious faith. Result: as they bring their own parents to court (!) if someone telling to me I just don’t believe it. This is the reality, you are surrounded the everyday’s crime, which become the US culture. Did you know that 25% of the world jail population here in USA? So be proud of your self, because we are like to pick on anything but never on the real cause.
John Mainhart
5 months ago
My wife and I read thiss together and all we can say is Amen.

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