Some Thoughts in the Aftermath of Tragedy.

As national mourning continues for the victims of the horror in Newtown, several thoughts have occurred to me.  The first is the incredible cynicism of both the national media and our national government.  At least since the Columbine massacre, there have been many voices pointing specifically to an essential element needed if ever we are to stop these atrocious acts.  The verdict is unanimous among professionals from many disciplines.  Do not give these murderous monsters 24/7 international notoriety on television.   Psychologists have spelled out precisely what should not be done.  In every case, that is exactly what the national media does do, thereby immeasurably increasing the likelihood that such acts will continue.  Why is this?  Stupidity? Insensitivity? Ignorance? Lack of discipline?  Lack of real concern? Lust for ratings? Fear that if they don’t compete they will lose their audience? All of the above?  Whatever it is, there is no excuse. 

And our national government is just as bad.  While proclaiming that we must not politicize this tragedy, our venal and foolish leaders do exactly the opposite, joining with the insane media to inflame even more passion and further divide the country.  The United States is being turned into a spiritual and psychological kennel full of rabid dogs.  Apparently, our leaders want to see us tear each other to pieces.  If they really want to stop these massacres let them legislate controls over the idiot media – controls to be instituted the moment each situation begins.  The truth is that 24/7 news coverage of such horrors is far more responsible for their continuation than gun ownership.  Which brings us to the most cynical part of all.  Why try to stop such coverage when it can be used to fulfill your agenda?  Needless to say such controls will never be legislated, because there is the First Amendment.  Mark this prediction:  Gut the Second Amendment and destruction of the First will soon follow.

The second thought that has struck me (yet again) is the utter impotence of secular materialists across our culture to accept the reality and meaning of Evil.  I don’t mean people doing bad, even awful things. I mean Evil that is beyond humanity, evil that is Satanic in very specific and personal terms.  Every time this kind of Evil erupts there is a collective wringing of hands, followed by futile groping attempts to apply the worthless cookie cutter of psycho/social philosophy to inhuman hate and bloodlust.  In war, an army dedicated to losing is one that refuses to understand and accept the reality of its enemy.  Because secular materialists refuse to accept the reality of our Enemy, they dither in utter confusion flailing at branches while never touching the tree or its hideous root.   Blind leaders of the blind, they lead society like sheep to the slaughter.

This blindness regarding Satanic Evil has cost millions of lives and it will cost untold millions more.  It was this blindness that led western leaders to misunderstand the true nature of Hitler and Nazism.  It led to futile attempts to negotiate with Satan’s human representatives.  (And I mean that very literally.)  While the secular materialists of western culture discussed, dawdled and dithered, the ovens burned.  All of that is coming again because we refuse to accept reality.

That young murderer in Newtown was filled with an Evil Power beyond himself that expressed its hatred and bloodlust through his willing mind and hands.  I don’t know how the possession took place, how he became “perfectly possessed,” but there is no question that it happened.  What “mental illness” would make a twenty-year-old want to shoot children over and over and watch them die?   The same Evil that shoved them into ovens.  The same Evil that hates all of humanity because, by the Grace of God, we bear the Image of God.  You do not negotiate with it.  You do not medicate it or try to talk it out through endless hours of therapy.  Incarcerating it does not work because prisons and iron bars mean nothing to it.  You find it, confront it, and cast it out by the One Power that is far greater, the Blood of Jesus Christ that was shed to cleanse the world of sin.

I am well aware that my secular materialist friends will consider such a statement to be utter foolishness, the product of an unsophisticated, even dangerously primitive mind.  So be it.  The dangerously primitive mind of Saint Paul, a brilliant Jew who penned some of the most beautiful and powerful words in any language, told us this, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against Principalities, against Powers, against the Rulers of the Darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.”  Was he just primitive and deluded? 

To my friends who think he was, I would say this:  If you are wrong and Saint Paul was correct, if the Bible is correct, in the years that lie ahead you are going to see Darkness and Evil come upon the world such as has never been in recorded history.  Someday you may be confronted by a terrifying Darkness beyond anything you have ever imagined.  And it will be very personal. When that moment comes, remember one thing.  Remember the Name of the King.  Call out to Jesus and keep calling out…then see what happens.