While
Herod and Bethlehem seem long ago and far away to those of us living in America
today, the horror we felt when reports came in from Connecticut is exactly the
same. (Perhaps even more so in our case because we have grandkids living just
down the road from Newtown.) Surely
parents of the 20 little boys and girls who were gunned down by a mentally ill
20 year old would have escaped with their loved ones if it had been possible
for them to do so. Oceans of ink have
been poured into reporting on this disaster and even more will be written in
the days and weeks ahead about what can be done to prevent another bloodbath.
But with all this said we still have to express our point of view and design a
game plan of our own.
My
first step is to check with local school authorities to make sure they are at
the top of their game by reviewing whatever security systems are already in
place. And yes, we should all learn more about mental illness and how to
recognize danger signs. But most of all we should lean on our elected officials
to tell them they MUST support commonsense national legislation to actually DO
something about the scandalous gun madness here in our United States of America.
