Mark Shea is on a rant against machine guns. If Mark has not updated his archive then go to his main blog page and scroll down looking for the paragragh that includes "MACHINE FRICKIN' GUNS!"
Earth to gun freaks: no civilian needs a machine gun. If you are Catholic who disagrees with that, I submit it's because you really believe the Constitution to be more sacred than the normal Catholic teaching about morality ordered toward the common good. In short, you are wrong and are helping to make such crimes possible by your disordered intellect.
This must be one of those Catholic either/or arguments rather than a Catholic both/and argument. It's impossible to make any real pro-gun right argument to satisfy an emotional requirement of "need." To prove that "need" one must first overcome an emotional bias. A gauntlet has been thrown down, demanding an emotional counter response. In fact, Mark seems to have intended it that way. He has equated second amendment supporters with those who oppose a ban on machine guns (although the NFA of 1934 regulated machine guns). Yes, Mark said "some" to highlight the extremists, but he also barred the door to any slippery slope arguments -- which it is plausible to argue in light of the history of gun control laws -- by arguing that it is a question of need. I don't intend to argue that any gun is necessary.
On the same day, this was reported: A picture with the caption: "Jail escaper Karen Lynn Lovell holding a gun to her son's head yesterday."
A mother with a pistol to her child's head. I find it difficult to construct an argument that anyone needs a pistol.
Perhaps that's just so much hyperbole. The Bible provides examples of the use of swords; St. Peter carried a sword and drew blood during the Passion (John18:10). Yet, even then, Peter was rebuked. "Put your sword into its scabbard. Shall I not drink the cup that the Father gave me?" (John 18:11) "Put your sword back into its sheath, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword." (Matt 26:52). Pacifists might believe that Jesus was questioning the need for the sword... but still, the Church has allowed for self-defense. So if Scripture is silent about guns, we can make allowances for technological advance of pistols and machine guns. We can weigh the dangers against the rights and needs.
From personnal experience, I find it difficult to construct an argument that anyone needs alcohol (except priests for the Blessed Sacrament). Sure, there's biblical evidence that alcohol was licit, but that's before the industrial age and before big heavy machinery. In my lifetime, I've had two uncles succumb to alcoholism. Dead. Literally, puking up blood sort of dead. But more than the individual destruction, there is the harm of those around them. And the dangers involve more than the immediate family. The second uncle to fall to this temptation drove heavy equipment such as snow ploughs and construction vehicles. Before he died, he was fired for drinking on the job.
But however fortunate it is that we have bosses who can fire employees for unrepentent drinking, anyone has access to heavy machinery: they're called automobiles. There were no automobiles during biblical times, and I wonder if alcohol would have been licit if alcohol and automobiles could have been combined then as guns and bullets are now. Could we weigh the dangers against the needs?
Of course, Prohibition didn't work. It was then that the machine gun was used to assist rumrunners in breaking the law. It was then that machine guns were regulated (The National Firearms Act of 1934 following Al Capone and the Valentine's Day massacre).
So even though I cannot see the need for alcohol, I cannot bring myself to say, "In short, you are wrong and are helping to make such crimes possible by your disordered intellect."
I don't need alcohol. I don't need guns. I have neither in my home. But I don't make arguments on the basis of a lack of need. There are very few things that I need (I could go so far as to say that I don't need a home). Such things as self-defense are based in the context of time and place. Surely Israeli citizens have a need for deadly looking assault weapons against cowardly terrorists who seek to prey on the defenseless. Surely British citizens have a need for self-defense against burglars (if you are not aware, crime in Britain has increased even as their government has tightened the screws on firearms -- the unarmed bobbies of old now see the necessity of arms -- is there a correlation?).
The disordered minds are not the law-abiding citizens who would responsibly and safely use these weapons, but the criminals who would not. Criminals have no need to promote gun rights -- such things are foreign to their thinking. Indeed, if they were rational, they would argue for a more defenseless population.
No one needs alcohol. But we don't argue that drunk driving -- something that is illegal -- provides the rational for a complete ban on alcohol. Not many argue that the availability of alcohol encourages drunk driving.
Certainly, we can argue that our society is disordered, that our citizens are like children whom we cannot trust with alcohol or guns. But perhaps the solution is form the children into adults rather than assume they can never be trusted as adults.
None but a fringe minority will argue that criminals should be allowed guns, or that alcoholics should be allowed to drink and drive. But by making guns and alcohol legally available, are we in fact making these abuses possible? Non sequitur. Those truly disordered minds will find a way to obtain these items whether they are freely available or not. History and current events prove the verity of this statement.
And finally, I am not arguing against any regulation of firearms or alcohol. There are arguments for prudent regulation of any sort of "right." Most reasonable arguments will be over where the line should be drawn. But I am most put off by the argument of Pope Mark Shea, who with the full force of the Magisterium, declares that the line is drawn here, no dissent beyond here is permissible. Well. *That* should piss off a few people.
Posted by Bob at May 10, 2003 10:10 AM