Time For Another Crusade Against The Saracen?
The Catholic Church and the AR-15
When I joined The Church around my 35th year, coming over from Judaism, I joined because frankly it seemed the most aesthetically beautiful and intellectually coherent of the Christian faiths. And, notwithstanding regular pronouncements from the current pontiff on economic and environmental issues, it still seems to me to be the faith of Aquinas, Augustine of Hippo, Evelyn Waugh, etc.
Well, joined for that and in appreciation of the Albino Assassins of the Vatican. I mean, how cool is that? Any deviance from Church doctrine and a chalk white hitman shows up and arranges you a personal meeting with St. Peter… What?... You mean ‘The DaVinci Code’ wasn’t real? Darn, oh well.
However, I have been a tad perplexed recently upon hearing heretofore sensible Catholic associates, no doubt some motivated by sincere compassion, blame an inanimate object for the recent massacre in Orlando.
It’s the same argument we heard during the Cold War; i.e.- because of the profusion of nuclear weapons the weapons themselves were the problem, not the red fascist fingers on the Soviet button. And of course, these Cassandras turned out to be correct, as numerous and sundry SS-21s and MX missiles independently and by their own accord flew to cities world around the world rendering those areas charred lifeless radioactive holes.
Oh, wait…
In point of fact, the weapon many are making such a fuss about, the AR-15, wasn’t even the weapon used in the Orlando shooting. That weapon, employed by a radical jihadi who, as I write, is broiling in the eternal rotisserie, was a Sig Sauer MCX carbine. But dearie me, the “assault rifle” (calling a rifle an “assault rifle” is like calling a fork an “eating fork”) sure looks scary to the uninitiated and thus the myth grew until now even certain sainted members of our own Church are drinking the ballistic Kool-Aid and decrying the availability of these weapons to the public.
Well, I know it might be a shock, but first off, innocent citizens have a right, and I daresay a duty, to protect themselves and those they hold precious. Secondly, the spooky AR-15 (AR, btw, standing for Armalite, the manufacturer, not for “assault rifle”. Geee…) fires at the exact same rate of speed as the Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model. Yes, the same BB gun gifted to young Ralphie by his dad in ‘The Christmas Story’. Both fire one round at the squeezing of the trigger one time. No, not a machine gun. Not a rifle one can switch to automatic fire by the flipping of a switch like my old Army M-16. One bullet, one pull on the trigger just like perfectly legal, for now, hunting rifles or small handguns.
We Catholics who have read St. Augustine on Just War can, by the transitive property, take it to condone just defense in the face of attack. We also recognize, as did the Founding Fathers, that a well-armed citizenry is a deterrent to tyranny, not to mention a deterrent to civil mayhem. For as that deathbed convert to Catholicism Oscar Wilde opined, “An armed society is a polite society.”
Thus, as a public boon and a service of logic to our unenlightened co-religionists, mercifully make them aware of these simple facts so as to render them less embarrassing to the rest of us in public discourse.
After all, in our almost five hundred year ease of effort to feel intellectually superior to Protestants, this isn’t helping one bit.
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About the Author
A veteran of service with NATO forces, US Army Intelligence, and the First Infantry Division, David Kamioner is a cum laude graduate of the University of Maryland’s European Division and spent over thirty years as a political consultant, academic, writer, and corporate PR director. He hails from New York City and grew up in South Florida.
He served with the American Red Cross as part of the relief effort for Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005 and Hurricane Sandy in 2012. For several years he ran homeless shelters, most recently homeless shelters for US military veterans. He currently works in veterans affairs.
