Calling All Adults...

I, like many people across the Country and around the world, am struggling to know how to respond to the slaughter of 20 young children, and 6 of their teacher/caregivers this past week.  I have been encouraged to read over these past several days, many thoughtful articles and interviews where people seem to understand that we can no long simply call the gunman "a monster" or even simply blame the NRA, for this absolutely horrific tragedy.  This event seems to have created a "paradigm shift" in people's understanding, or lack there-of, of these types of events.  We all seem to finally be understanding that this is bigger than any one "hot political issue" and far more serious than we have been able to grasp up until now.  I titled this blog post, "Calling All Adults" because I believe that it will take many difficult choices, to bring about a comprehensive response to this crisis of gun violence in our Country.  Children make decisions based on what they "want".  Adults are supposed to be the ones that make decisions on what is best, for our children.  Only adults are needed at the table.

We need adults from within the NRA.   I was encouraged by Senator Joe Manchion from West Virginia, an "A Rated" NRA member, speaking truth this morning on Morning Joe along with the host, Joe Scarborough.  He points out correctly, that this event shatters any and all arguments presented in the past by the NRA that any limitations on gun ownership is a violation of the 2nd Amendment.  If I recall the Amendment correctly, it calls for a "well regulated militia".  Why would a very responsible and well trained user of guns, not want to be held up as an example of how to be a responsible user of guns?  Would it not be an honor to be considered one of the "well trained militia", ready and able to assist in protecting this great country of ours?  Why would that same person want just anyone to have that same access to guns?  The NRA needs to be at the table of adults who help protect the most innocent among us, our children and grandchildren.  But please, only adults allowed who are ready and willing to make difficult choices, based on what is best for our children.

We also need adult professionals from the field of Mental Health.  The fact that it is easier for an adolescent to get mental health care, only after commiting a crime, is unacceptable!  For many youth, the first time they can accually access mental healthcare is when they come into the Juvenile Justice system.  Why must it be so difficult for parents to access mental health services for their children?  I work with teenagers in the foster care system.  I have seen this reality play out time and again.  A young person, self-medicating with illegal drugs due to not getting proper mental healthcare, finally gets the help they need only AFTER they commit a crime.  I have been in the position of actually having prayed that one youth I have in  my care as a Guardian Ad Litem, would pick up a charge so that she could finally begin accessing a full set of services for substance abuse and mental health.  There is something wrong with that and we adults need to fix this.

Finally, we need authentic leaders of faith to stop whining about how all these tragedies will stop when we allow God back into our schools.  I once attended an open house for a new Charter School in our District and one of the young teachers had written on her hand, "Trust God".  The School Staff was presenting to a group of parents on the benefits they hoped to offer at this new school.  This young teacher was obviously a woman of faith and teaching in a Public School.  Since leaving my teaching position at a Catholic Elementary School, I have worked in the "public" sector within the Dependency System in the State of Florida.  I have come across more true people of faith in the public sector, who do not wear their faith on their sleave, yet who live out the Gospel imperative to love one another each and every day.  And not all of them are professed Christians!  We need to have an adult understanding of how God works in and through ALL our communities, through our love and care for each other.  Nobody can say that a teacher who hides her students in closets and cabinets and then confronts a gunman with a lie, "they are in the gym", did not lay down her life for her students.  How was God not present in that?  People with an underdeveloped understanding of God and how God works in this world, need not come to the table, Mike Huckabee.

I believe it will be the young parents, and those of us on the cusp of our grandparenting years, that will not let this one go.  We need adults willing to come to the table though, and place their own "wants" aside in order to do what is best for our children and grandchildren.  If we can't protect them from being slaughtered in our schools, then who ARE we?  Certainly, not the adults they need us to be.