Two brothers in Chino Hills California aged 10 and 12 died on July 27th from gunshot wounds. The police are calling it a double suicide. A city is grieved and the police say they have never seen such an act like this by so young as these two bothers in the State of California. In fact this story has covered the globe as it was a main story even in papers in Europe This story of death is not related to sex, as many death crimes are. Instead this is police saying that two boys; both brothers took their fathers hand gun that was unlocked and used it to commit an act of suicide. We will never know why it happened; as only God knows what happened on that tragic day.
I have read many of the comments from people who either have judged the parents or the kids by calling them stupid, or they have judged the media because they portrayed it as a lead story. Most of the comments are insensitive, cruel in nature with a tinge of a self righteous viewpoint. Where are the words of any comfort, compassion, or kindness towards this family or even for these two brothers?
Let me ask all you folks something; what do you think makes a lead story; what makes a story be on a national scale or a local scale? Columbine High school deaths were on a national scale; as it should have been. But is not the death of two little boys in the way it so far appears to have happened; be on a national scale?
Because you see on a national scale it becomes a wakeup call to fathers; sons, mothers, and all family members to take time and pause for just a moment and reflect on what is really missing here in this story, and that is the constant bombardment of children exposed to death and murder either in television, video games, or in music and books. Our kids are numb to seeing murder portrayed in any form of entertainment. They don’t cry when they see people die in shows or in shoot up video games where they can live in a fantasy world of killing people by the hand units on the X-Box or Play station games;; but we rationalize this because it is just a video game or just a TV show. People may say there is no correlation between make believe murder in entertainment vehicles and real outright acts of violence by kids these days. That can be debated by you, and many psychologists.
But there is one thing that cannot be disputed. The best deterrent that keeps kids from wanting to kill or be killed is showing children the benefits of developing a prayer life; and of reading the Bible. It’s so hard to kill yourself or others when you get off your knees from having just prayed to God for yourself and or your loved ones. I really don’t recall anyone reading the bible and going out to kill oneself unless they are deeply mentally disturbed and of course there are people who suffer mental illness; but putting those type of people aside for a moment, the Bible is a great place to help our kids in a world that runs its own definition of sanity; which plays by its own rules of love and hate and tells our kids what is right or wrong by its own moral definition thus rationalizing violent behavior as entertainment; but it only leaves us weeping at the sight of two dead brothers; children who obviously did not know the hope nor the future; nor the love that God had for them on a cross. We live in a society where God is really not the center of the home, and we live now with the carnage of it; be it Columbine or the death of two precious boys or simply with children who walk around with no hope.
Some people think I am referring to prayer when I speak of having thrown God out of the classroom. Having being raised Catholic and Jewish I would say this much; in almost every college class I was in, God was attacked so much by my college professors when they gave their lectures that I would have sworn that God must have been sitting in one of the classroom chairs. When a kid is picked on in class by other kids or by a teacher he or she is usually sitting there in the class. In fact I remember sitting in the front of a history class and turning my head to see if God was sitting in the back row as he was being blasted so much by my history professor. Because those professors acted as though he was there in the classroom. God thrown out of the classroom. No! I don’t think so, because they sure acted as though he was sitting there to be chewed out. They really didn’t want him thrown out of each of their classrooms because God was their poster boy to beat up each week. Has he been thrown out of classrooms? Ask my old college professors and if they were honest with themselves they would say-No; not really.
By the way this isn’t about whether prayer should be in school or not. You don’t force kids to pray but being a Jew raised in a Catholic School with a Greek orthodox Mom and Rabbi’s on my dad’s side this much I do remember; prayer in school; and believe you me we had plenty of it in Catholic school and of course in Hebrew school, really didn’t do me any harm nor any of my friends. A person wrote me and said the Bible was a horrible thing to show children. I thought what planet is this guy living on. He wrote and said that the Bible was full of topics that relate to sex, murder, and every other heinous acts. Sure it is and we would be blind to deny it. But that is because the Bible is only revealing what is in the heart of man; a sin stained heart. Wow, a book that is honest and doesn’t hide the dark sides of a man or women’s heart; or the good side of it; what a novel idea.
Yeah, the Bible does reveal the ugly side of man and the good side of mankind and it is best reflected in what we as Jews and what we as Christians read in this book and what many Christians call the Bible. Did my Mom and Dad pray? Yes, Did they make me pray; no. But seeing them on their knees made a difference in me because it revealed a humble posture that is hard to describe because it takes allot of humble guts to get on your knees and admit the world isn’t all about you. I didn’t show or tell my 5 year old boy about the dark side of man that the Bible reveals anymore than me reading to him ‘The Valley of the Dolls”, or taking my 5 year old son to see an X-rated movie. A 5 year old mind isn’t ready to read or hear about the dark side of man; not yet as he will find out soon enough.
The Bible does have its villains and its true heroes and it takes a parents wisdom to discern how to share at the right time in the right manner about the evil as well as the good men and women of the Bible. I don’t know whether these boys ever prayed by their bedside or over a meal or if they ever read or heard of the Bible or even went to church. This much I do know; these boys went to church on Friday-in two white hertz’s as they were on their way to be buried. I was sick to my stomach to see the motorcade pass me by as I was driving to work. I was sick thinking about the grief these parents would be feeling having to bury two of their precious sweet boys. I once played Santa Claus for kids at my company’s Christmas Party. I really didn’t want to put on the old smelly costume they gave me to wear but I did it for the kids as I was the fatso that could look like Santa the best. The children really looked up to me and I loved them sitting in my lap. But I am no Santa Claus and I am no Moses or for that matter any other Bible character for that matter either; but my son still looks up to me because he sees me on my knees. He doesn’t hear what I say on my knees as much as he sees me on my knees and perhaps we as parents would do well to be in such a position as that at least once in a while.
Is the death of these two precious boys about the subject of gun control, or the lack of parents who should have had better judgment in locking up a hand gun? What is really sad is no one is asking what is causing the moral decay that would make a child kill himself. Isn’t that really the question we should be asking ourselves? As for what is causing the moral decay; assuming you believe there is some sort of decay; I will leave that to my readers to decide. Some say it is video games that made the boys committ suicide. This much I do know and that is my son loves video games as he is 13 years old. We will go to Gamestop to buy the games and yet it is so hard to find a game that dosen’t have allot of killing within a game. I truly believe there are more games on killing than there is on any other subject. Did these two boys see constant killing in video games? The police won’t say what they watched, we only know that the parents withheld them viewing their video games for a short while due to some issue in the home; an issue the police felt should have had no bearing on them taking their lives. Thus the video gaming industry has been blasted for what may be viewed as a reason for their deaths. I won’t comment on that issue; but this I do know that the best selling video games show killing and death and that kids watch these games for hours. Makes you stop and wonder what their minds were thinking.
On a final note about the parents of these two boys. Word has it that when word got out that John W. Hinckley Jr. tried to kill President Regan in 1982, Dr/Rev Billy Graham called John Hinckley’s parents Jack and Jo Ann to pray for them. While a nation was furious about Hinkleys attempt to kill the President and what kind of parents John Hinkley had, Billy Graham took a different position, he went to his knees to pray for Jack and Jo Ann Hinkley. Frank and Maria Gonzalez may not get a phone call today from Dr. Graham, due to his health; but perhaps all of us in some kind of way can demonstrate that same kind of call, that same kind of behavior that Billy Graham portrayed toward parents. A position that starts on our knees. Maybe there is something beneficial about that Bible sitting in your closet after all. There is truly allot of guys and gals on their knees in that book. Something to think about.
