Christian Arguments for Gun Violence Prevention: Reflections on Moral Claims in the Context of Advocacy

Abstract

This article begins with an overview of Christian moral arguments that surface in the context of gun violence prevention advocacy. The description focuses on three claims that appear in press events and many web resources: all life is sacred, the sin of idolatry, and a call to nonviolence. Running through these arguments are references to vulnerability that bring significant moral confusion. Is vulnerability something to be addressed as a social problem, accepted as existentially inevitable, or embraced as a sign of faithfulness? The third part of the article returns to the contexts of activism to introduce a third space, the vigil. When participants in the vigil read the names of victims and hear the stories of survivors, we are reminded that gun violence prevention necessitates a distinction between actual vulnerability to gun violence, existential vulnerability as finite creatures in a fragile creation, and a virtuous vulnerability that voluntarily assumes risk as a sign of faith in God. The vigil not only reminds participants of these distinctions, but holds those vulnerable to gun violence at the center of concern around which one organizes a moral and political response that approaches vulnerability as a problem to address and not a virtue to commend.