Leaders in nine nations explain how they think theologically and biblically about personal safety as mass shootings plague the world.
Last week, a former police officer killed 36 people, many of them very young children, at a daycare center in northeastern Thailand. The massacre, which was carried out through stabbing, vehicle ramming, and shooting, came several weeks after a gunman shot and killed 17 people at a school in Central Russia. In, July, terrorists launched a gun and bomb attack at church in southwest Nigeria on a Sunday, killing an estimated 70 worshipers.
The United States has experienced several high-profile mass shootings this year including a July 4 shooting outside of Chicago where seven people were killed, a grocery store in Buffalo where 10 people were killed, and an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas where a gunman killed 21 people.
In the US, white evangelicals are more likely than members of other faith groups or the average citizen to own a gun; 41 percent do, compared to 33 percent of white mainline Protestants, 32 percent of the unaffiliated, 29 percent of black Protestants, and 24 percent of Catholics. A majority of white evangelicals who own a handgun carry it with them (65%, versus 57% of all gun owners) because they view it as a safety precaution, according to these 2017 numbers from Pew Research Center.
Additionally, Americans who attended religious services weekly were less likely to own a gun than those who attend less frequently (27% vs. 31%), the study also found. And Americans with a high level of religious commitment were less likely to own a gun than those whose commitment is low (26% vs. 33%).
Earlier this year, CT reached out to church leaders from nine different countries to learn more about gun ownership and their thoughts on this subject as Christians. Answers to the following questions are arranged from those who …
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