Earlier this week, an 18-year-old murderer took the lives of teachers and elementary school children. This morning, twenty-one families awoke again to the horror that their children, their precious ones, were taken from them in a deadly and cowardly act. There’s no reason to name the killer. He deserves just one appellation. Evil. The only names that matter are the children and teachers, the innocents who were slaughtered. Just thinking of this is nauseating. Sadness, disbelief, weeping, anger. Why?
I wrote many “why” questions last week. But this “why” shakes me to my core. The carnage we have seen in America is stunning and rightfully should provoke outrage. But this case is bewildering.
In a small Texas town many of us didn’t know existed, Evil struck. Now Robb Elementary in Uvalde will be added the monuments of horror that define the history of a nation that has fallen deeper into dysfunctional violence. Why? Why does this sort of thing happen with greater frequency than the soul can comprehend or bear?
The politicization of Evil’s act will be vulgar. The craven minstrels of misfortune will seek to blame what has occurred on the instruments of violence and access to them. The tune they will pipe will be familiar. Competing political factions will predictably blame one another and offer “comprehensive” legislation to resolve a problem that cannot be legislated away. We will be told it can be. But it cannot be legislated away. Why?
The cost of the violence that besets our nation threatens to undermine our civilization. And it is our civilization that we must stare in the face. What has happened that makes us so less civil? What wrong turn did we take? Are our problems a lack of laws, or a corruption of our culture? It’s the latter, sadly. Indeed, our culture rests in a bed of customs, traditions, and moral standards. We have rejected these, and with it, the pursuit of virtue.
We are certainly more coarse and vulgar than we have been in the past. Many people have turned from organized religion to look for other systematic ways to shape their world view, to find a reason for living. They won’t find it with satisfaction unless they look in the right place. Redemption matters, because we live in a fallen world and our best efforts to prop it up in our own strength will fail. We need help.
For those of us who have a world view that centers on a Creator God of love and mercy, yet who is very clear about the nature of sin, righteousness, and judgment, we know our smallness well. We need the strength that comes with the belief that there is a way to live better in a world that is beset with much brokenness and sin.
One of the blessings we have been given is the family structure: fathers, mothers, children, grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins bound together in a relationship of love, nurturing, care, teaching, and encouragement. Sadly, not all of us had that kind of family. For those of us who did, we can testify that relationships form us. That what is good for us as people is handed down transcendently from one generation to another. No family does it perfectly and, so too, bad can be passed along as well.
It all depends on what is at the center of a family, indeed our culture. The worldview: Is it one of love and mercy that recognizes that sin in the world can corrupt the best of individuals and structures? Is it one that, while loving, is also correcting, one that guides children along the path that will make them productive and responsible citizens in our society? Do we have that now? No. We have strayed too far and the toll on us also vexes our culture.
I suppose some think that blaming our problems on the collapse of the traditional family in America is trite, or somehow intolerant. It is neither. Nor is it an excuse for failing to pass this or that law to make all that is wrong once again right. But it should be clear to those who have eyes that see and ears that hear that one of the existential threats to society is the demise of fatherhood. Fathers matter in our culture.
And not just for young boys but young girls also. Fathers are as vital in the care and upbringing of children as the mothers who bring them into the world. Both are vital in shaping a young person, both male and female, to be the best they can be in a world filled with many challenges.
When Fathers are absent from the lives of their children, a critical void is left in a child’s psyche. In that void Evil grows up.
1 Comment
Vonnah Rolband · May 28, 2022 at 12:15 pm
I could not agree more. Thank you for expressing this so eloquently. The root causes of the problems facing America are the failure of the family structure, the failure or our public school system, and the movement away from organized religion. The failure of the school system and the movement from religion is linked to the failure of the family structure. Current social programs in place contribute to the failure of the family structure, and require reform.