Lamenting that Americans treat firearms as “idols,” Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller, the archbishop of San Antonio, Tex., which incorporates Uvalde, urged people to be “led by the Spirit” as they consider how best to answer the continued gun violence plaguing cities and towns throughout the USA.
“Now we have a system or systems which are failing,” the archbishop said. “They’re obsolete. They’re not, anymore, what we’d like as a society.”
The archbishop has met with members of the family of the 19 children and two teachers killed by a gunman on May 24 and preached at a Mass attended by President Biden and his wife, Jill, last month. He lamented that politics has gotten in the way in which of helping repair systems which may make people safer and questioned those that say that more studies are needed before motion is taken.
“Now we have a system or systems which are failing,”Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller said. “They’re obsolete. They’re not, anymore, what we’d like as a society.”
“Now we have been losing lives and youngsters and young people and adults and elderly, in hospitals, in schools and in churches,” he said. “What other studies do we’d like to do of dead bodies?”
The archbishop was speaking at a panel on recent gun violence hosted by the Georgetown University Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life on June 8.
Reflecting on a shooting at a medical constructing in Tulsa, Okla., on June 1, that left two doctors and two others dead, the pinnacle of the nation’s largest Catholic health care organization warned that not addressing the proliferation of shootings will negatively affect medical care in the USA.
Mary Haddad, R.S.M., the president and chief executive officer of the Catholic Health Association, called gun violence “a public health crisis.”
“Consequently of the tragedy in Tulsa, our hospitals and our clinics are actually spending more dollars to extend security,” Sister Haddad said. “Money that needs to be invested in patient care is being diverted to maintain people from being shot in a spot of healing. It’s absurd.”
“Money that needs to be invested in patient care is being diverted to maintain people from being shot in a spot of healing. It’s absurd.”
She called on elected officials to enact “sensible gun policies” and warned that not doing so would put health care staff liable to more violence and drive up costs.
“Each time a hospital is forced to rent more security, construct more security checkpoints and install more metal detectors, it’s money that’s being diverted from care and treatment of patients,” she said. “It’s a value we find yourself paying, whether it’s in higher medical bills, premiums or reduction in services.”
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators are currently negotiating on where Democrats and Republicans might find common ground on gun safety laws, and this morning, a survivor of the Uvalde shooting told a congressional committee her story about hiding from the gunman by covering herself within the blood of a classmate.
“We cannot proceed to let our youngsters do the heavy lifting,” said Judy Byron, O.P., who noted how survivors of faculty shootings have called on lawmakers to enact changes for years, with seemingly little success. “Now we have to be the adults.”
“We cannot proceed to let our youngsters do the heavy lifting,” said Judy Byron, O.P. “Now we have to be the adults.”
Sister Byron, the director of the Northwest Coalition for Responsible Investment, said she and other activist investors put pressure on gun manufacturers to make the weapons safer. Her group tries to pressure the businesses to adopt a human rights policy and study how their business impacts human rights. She said bank card firms must also be pressured to think about how their platforms help enable the trafficking of guns.
“We actually need to teach ourselves,” she said.
Speaking specifically to the May 14 shooting in Buffalo that left 10 people dead, each of them Black, the Rev. Bryan Massingale, a theologian at Fordham University, said it was essential to call that event what it was: a hate crime.
“And hate crimes are intended to send a message,” Father Massingale said. “That message was received not only by myself but by all of my parishioners, that it is a country where our lives aren’t protected. A rustic where our lives don’t matter.”
He said church leaders have to be more willing to interact within the politically fraught debate over the way to stem gun violence in the USA and encourage Catholics to see gun violence as a life issue.
“I feel the church must stop being afraid of controversy,” Father Massingale said. “At this point, we’d like to begin naming some names. We’d like to call out the N.R.A., and we’d like to speak in regards to the influence of cash in our politics.”
