There God broke the flashing arrows, the shields and the swords, the weapons of war. Psalm 76:3
I grew up around guns. My father hunted small game—doves, ducks, squirrels, geese, the occasional rabbit and quail. When I was about 12, my father gave me a single-shot shotgun, with the stock cut down to fit. A couple years later he gave me a “regular” size 12 gauge shotgun. Around that time he also gave me a .22 handgun. And a few years before he died he gave me his prized 20 gauge Browning over-and-under shotgun. I don’t have the small one, but I still have the other three.
For what it’s worth, when our daughter was born, Anne made me store the ammunition (not much) in a different room from the weapons. Now the guns are on our second floor, and the ammunition is in the basement.
I haven’t fired any of them since before I moved from Memphis in 1985. So it’s fair to ask why I still have them. It’s part sentimentality, part pack-rat, and part the thought (or fantasy?) that one of these years I’ll have an opportunity to hunt again.
I enjoyed hunting. It was time with my father, and his friends. It was something of a rite of passage to be allowed to go with them. And in all honesty, it’s a genuine skill to hit a dove 40 yards out flying downwind at 50-60 mph, and darting around to boot. I rarely succeeded.
The best day I ever had, I hit the first four doves in row that came in range. I was feeling great. Then S. O. Thomas, one of my father’s friends and a gentle man who was one of the best shots around, yelled across the field, “Hoo-whee, Jamie! Let one through every now again!” And he laughed. I proceeded to miss the next 22 shots in a row, and went home with four birds.
For me that was what hunting was about. It wasn’t about killing animals. It was about fellowship. I know, I know. How can you separate those things out? Maybe I’ll try to figure that out some other time.
I tell you this in order to say that I don’t hate guns. But I do hate the irresponsible use of them, especially to shoot people. When at 14 you have five grown men, some of them members of the NRA, all staring at you because you forgot to unload before crossing a fence, you tend to remember. “Jamie,” one of them said (not my father), “Don’t you ever do that again.” So it’s heartbreaking when someone uses a gun to kill or wound someone, to destroy the trust in a community.
Guns are dangerous and not to be trifled with, and that’s why I believe they should be regulated. That’s why everyone, from hunters to dealers to police to military, needs to take responsibility—including registration, a significant waiting period before you can buy one, banning the sale of automatic weapons and over-sized magazines, and having merchants adhere to a code of conduct.
Yes, I know most of the arguments against those things. But it’s not the guns that are irresponsible; it’s some people who are.
Grace and peace, Jamie
