The alleged synagogue shooter was a churchgoer who talked Christian theology, raising tough question

[IronLionZion]

The alleged synagogue shooter was a churchgoer who talked Christian theology, raising tough questions for evangelical pastors

https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2019/05/01/alleged-synagogue-shooter-was-churchgoer-who-articulated-christian-theology-prompting-tough-questions-evangelical-pastors/?utm_term=.f78da367ed88&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1



Before he allegedly walked into a synagogue in Poway, Calif., and opened fire, John Earnest appears to have written a seven-page letter spelling out his core beliefs: that Jewish people, guilty in his view of faults ranging from killing Jesus to controlling the media, deserved to die. That his intention to kill Jews would glorify God.

Days later, the Rev. Mika Edmondson read those words and was stunned. “It certainly calls for a good amount of soul-searching,” said Edmondson, a pastor in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, a small evangelical denomination founded to counter liberalism in mainline Presbyterianism. Earnest, 19, was a member of an OPC congregation. His father was an elder. He attended regularly. And in the manifesto, the writer spewed not only invective against Jews and racial minorities but also cogent Christian theology he heard in the pews.

So the pastor read those seven pages, trying to understand. “We can’t pretend as though we didn’t have some responsibility for him — he was radicalized into white nationalism from within the very midst of our church,” Edmondson said.

Earnest’s actions on Saturday in Poway — where he allegedly killed one Jewish worshiper and injured a rabbi, a child and another synagogue-goer — have spurred debate among evangelical pastors about the role of a certain stream of Christian theology in shaping the young man’s worldview, which allegedly turned deadly on the last day of the Passover holiday.

Christian extremists might find they have things in common with Islamic and other extremists.

[dalton99a]

1. "Only God can offer salvation to those he preselects"

and if you're not preselected, you're destined to be shot

[IronLionZion]

3. And humans get to select which other humans live or die

As if God has delegated those powers to extremist assholes here on earth.

Sometimes I just want to go up to an evangelical RW asshole and punch them in the face and tell them it's God's will. Maybe they'll turn the other cheek so I can punch them again.

[Hortensis]

4. :) Hmmm. Do you own guns? Have access to explosives?

Have you ever fantasized about killing or inflicting other extreme violence on others?

I've heard one of the huge problems profilers have is that the profiles of those who eventually act fit millions of people. How to find them? Data mining social media for additional clues is what they have right now, but it'll no doubt become increasingly sophisticated. Perhaps 7% of all lone perps of hate crimes like ketchup on sushi or idealize the morality of animals.

But in any case, if the answer to any of those was yes, best not say so.

[IronLionZion]

6. A good many of the perps are white males with guns

so they continue to profile brown-skinned people instead. And they get that wrong too because many Middle Eastern Muslims are light-skinned.

[keithbvadu2]

7. In most white Christian homes, Jesus is white, blond, blue-eyed.

In most white Christian homes, Jesus is white, blond, blue-eyed.

Not in Ben Carson's house.

[IronLionZion]

8. Dark skinned Jesus is great

My house also has multi-ethnic nativity scenes that my Mom hand painted.

But there are blonde middle eastern people from areas like: Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, Turkey, etc. There was a lot of migration and mixing over the centuries. When Malcolm X made his pilgrimage to Mecca and saw the diversity of Muslims there, he changed a lot of his racial views.

[Hortensis]

13. :) No one should delude themselves into thinking

being white makes them safe from scrutiny.

These U.S. government data are only for domestic terrorists, and RW and LW are declared ideology, not personality, but they provide some good insight anyway:

% of domestic terrorism crimes committed by:
RW, non-Muslim: 94%
Muslim*: 4%
LW, non-Muslim: 2%

*RW or LW not specified, but we can assume most are RW.

Of course by far most are men also.


In the U.S. 3/4 of us are white, only 13.3% black, etc., so of course authorities trying to intercept hate crimes before they happen are looking overwhelmingly at conservative white men, but of course all other skin colors as well. Authorities in predominantly black nations are focusing heavily on black men, in predominantly indigenous Hispanic nations on indigenous Hispanic men, etc, etc.

[malaise]

5. Ding ding we have a winner

They are sick fucks

[jberryhill]

2. Score 2 for Reformed Presbyterians!!!!

About the Orthodox Presbyterian Church:


In 1975, the OPC became a founding member of the North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council (NAPARC).[28] Through NAPARC, the OPC currently enjoys fraternal relations with the PCA, the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America, the Reformed Church in the United States, the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, the United Reformed Churches in North America, the Canadian and American Reformed Churches and several other confessional Continental Reformed and Presbyterian Churches in the United States and Canada.

About Mark David Chapman - who assassinated John Lennon:

In 1971, Chapman became a born-again Presbyterian and distributed Biblical tracts.

...

Chapman joined Blankenship as a student at Covenant College, an evangelical Presbyterian liberal arts college in Lookout Mountain, Georgia. However, Chapman fell behind in his studies and became obsessed with guilt over having an affair.

Covenant College is run by the PCA.

[Hortensis]

9. Does anyone else suspect mental derangement?

No one in the time of Trump should fail to understand that mental disorder does not have to take the form of actual insanity, or pathological hate be linked to religion. This guy might be quoting Sebastian Gorka if he hadn't fastened on religion, but one thing we know is that he'd be hating big time.

Hopefully more churches are genuinely asking these questions, helped along by the huge decline in the number of people currently identifying as religious. (Gee, wonder why.)

I also hope more will pay for training in identifying people who need professional help and/or alerting authorities since religion does tend to draw them. Like ER staffs are trained to look for signs of abuse.

[Ilsa]

10. Only if the murderer is white and christian. (Snicker)

No one else in the church is out stalking and murdering jews. Treat him like a murdering terrorist.

[IronLionZion]

12. Unfortunately the RW branches of many faiths are increasing in numbers

I'm sure most mass murderers have mental illness but it is still widely associated with certain demographics. As in whites are mentally ill and brown people are terrorists.

There was a scene in a TV show I saw recently "The Chi" where a black child didn't want to go to therapy after witnessing a murder because he felt mental health treatment was for whites only. We've also seen it with some families where the answer to a member experiencing mental health issues is "suck it up and quit whining".

[Hortensis]

22. Even most people who watch Trump daily refuse to

understand that personality disorder is a real thing.

Why non-religious people insist on regarding him as normal, I have no idea.

For most religious people, it's more understandable. How can they accept that all are not equally functioning on earth and also worship the goodness of a god who'll accepts no excuses short of full-blown insanity (and maybe not then) for avoiding hellfire? Of course some can, but so uncomfortable for all the rest.

[Caliman73]

21. The problem with "derangement".

Whenever something like this type of shooting or mass violence happens, people start looking at mental health and the perpetrator is seen as "crazy" or "deranged". It is quite a normal reaction because as "prolific" as these events seem, they are actually very rare. Most of us have some kind of mental/emotional distress, but we typically act out in minor, self destructive ways like overeating, drinking, procrastinating, etc... Outwardly destructive acts are typically yelling at our kids, spouses, partners; or just being a jerk to people in general. The VAST majority of us do not engage in such large scale acts of violence or even in significant acts of self harm like suicide.

The mental health system (if you can even call it a system) is geared toward trying to detect the most serious situations. Most jurisdictions have laws that allow for involuntary detention for "danger to self" (imminent suicidal threat), "danger to others" (imminent homicidal threat), and "grave disability" (inability to engage in life sustaining activities due to a mental illness). If you are identified as meeting one of the criteria, then you can be detained for observation and treatment. Again, the catch is that once you can show that you are no longer a threat, you HAVE to be released. There are usually recommendations for follow up, but they are voluntary.

Many of the people who do these acts of violence might fall into one of those categories, but are often flying below the radar. The signs, as you say, are there, but most people do not want to recognize them, and even in the case of Lanza and the Parkland shooter, they may even be under care, but because the emphasis is on privacy and liberty (which should usually be the case), the people treating them can't really even warn people that they may be dangerous.

Bring in religion or other types of behavioral control and the people who are the leadership do not want to even imagine that what they are saying can be facilitating a person turning to violence. There is the idea that the ideology itself may be corrupting that is rejected. There is also the idea of liability. You see people wanting to stamp out Islam because of terrorists. You see people wanting to stamp out all religion because of extremists. There are layers upon layers of denial within organizations when it comes to how their message might be contributing to people becoming violent.

Mental health in this country is an afterthought...at best. We work long hours, take the least amount of vacation of any modern economy. Mental health professionals are called "shrinks" and are often portrayed in media as idiots or worse. Psychology is called a "soft science" and is disrespected in society. The underlying message is that if you have emotional distress, it is because you are weak, especially if the distress becomes "clinical". Like I said, we are ALL walking around with problems and stress that makes our lives more difficult and shorter, yet we denigrate those who seek help either voluntarily or who are obligated to do so. There is such a stigma around emotional health that I am not sure how to overcome it in order to not only detect people who are on the verge of major destructive acts, but how to prevent people from getting there by cooling down the general level of stress we all suffer.

[hunter]

26. Yours is a thoughtful post.

The mental health care system is broken in the U.S.A. just as the health care system overall is broken.

[keithbvadu2]

11. It's not only Muslims being radicalized by religion, the internet, news.

It's not only Muslims being radicalized by religion, the internet, news.

[Kaleva]

14. Listening to Beatles music, according to now dead Manson, can inpire one to kill

Humans are irrational creatures who think up and do crazy shit and it gets even worse when the person is outside what may be considered the normal range range of wackiness.

[IronLionZion]

16. If white

If brown, it's terrorism

[GaYellowDawg]

15. There is a tiny sliver of hope here.

It's remarkable that the pastor even considered the idea that the church bore responsibility for the radicalization of the shooter. I've never heard that from an evangelical. Most churches and pastors would completely deny responsibility.

[IronLionZion]

17. Indeed, that's why I posted it

for many folks, the church (or synagogue, mosque, temple, etc.) is their community. People know each other very well and do a lot of activities together. It's surprisingly woke for an evangelical pastor to even think like this and hopefully consider some changes in their approach or preaching.

After other acts of violence, our society has called on moderates to denounce the extremists and to look for and report anyone becoming radicalized.

[lostnfound]

27. The manifesto. A dilemma of whether they should remain up on the internet

When a terrorist espousing religion and railing against infidels and Americans writes a screed, isn’t it held up sometimes as proof of how the evildoers hate America?

I understand not wanting to lionize the people that do this, but if it is indicative of a harmful ideology being taught, or if self examination is needed across American evangelical searches, doesn’t it need to have light shed on it?

They are preaching against liberals and against Jews?

Are we cultural Marxists and DU? Is that going to be a justification for others in the future?

[Coventina]

18. I'll bet my car that the pastor doesn't figure out that it's his own doctrine that's poison.

[IronLionZion]

19. It's the same with gun nuts: "what about the folks who didn't?"

as with most of these cases, it's a combination of factors: doctrine, hate media, guns, mental illness, and more

[muriel_volestrangler]

20. If your church was "founded to counter liberalism", you shouldn't be surprised

when a member becomes a right wing extremist. The danger was designed into the church from the start.

[maxsolomon]

23. Poor widdle Evangelicals.

This is on your delusional heads.

[LiberalFighter]

24. Some religions are breeding grounds for hate.

They teach hate directly or indirectly. How many remember growing up and there were major negatives pushed by your church against other religions?

[ck4829]

25. Disturbing.