It is estimated that 50% of the households in this country own firearms--half our citizens sleep with guns under their pillows. For protection, for self-defense, for sport. This fact may be as characteristic of our culture as any single feature we could name.

Bump, Bump, Bump

A very dear and lovely friend confessed to me her fear, her fear of living in the city. Fear of the crazies is the name she choose for the dank swamps of fragmented feelings and thoughts, jagged images and adrenaline rushes, which sometimes coursed in her gentle veins. Fear of violences and rapes. Capricious, and thus beyond all guard or defense. Chaotic and unconnected to process or plan. Bump, bump, bump, in the night, night, night.

And so it appears and perhaps is. But what, I wondered, if the story of our fate were God unfolding the universe as it should. Where then could we go to escape? As if we could move to some obscure hamlet and God would lose track of our address. Would not know where to send the terrors that wait to rend the night. Which caused me to wonder what it is that one would have to believe about the universe in order for the fears to make sense, in order for the strategy of escape to be viable. But first, about my other friend. . .

The Gun Under My Pillow

My other friend is every bit as lovely and gentle as the first. The thought of either of them enduring an unkind fate causes my heart to bleed a tear, and violates my every instinct of a just and godly universe. This other friend too confessed to me her fear, indirectly, by announcing that she sleeps in the company of a loaded gun, snuggles it in her pocket when she goes out to dump the trash. She fears for the innocence of her baby daughter; is prepared to kill, or at least to shoot, to protect her from fate rearing its uglier heads. This is new to her, and she had to argue with herself long and hard to convince her gentler instincts that this is indeed the thing to do. And maybe she's right. I don't know. But again I wondered just what she would have to believe to make of this gesture an expression of the best of sense. But first, about Arizona. . .

Arizona

I was born and raised in Arizona. Arizona, among other distinctions, is a state in which it is legal to carry a gun. Walk the streets with one. Wear it on your hip, as I have seen, when going to the neighborhood 7-11 for a quart of milk. The only thing which is not legal is to conceal your gun. Not, I am sure, because concealed guns are somehow more lethal; but because to carry a concealed weapon is not honorable somehow. If you are going to walk around armed you should wear it naked and proud, on your hip for all to see. The Code of the West I suppose.

There are other curious cultural quirks in it too. I never see anyone in the small towns with a sidearm. Only in the cities like Phoenix and Tucson will you find the guy in the supermarket checkout line in front of you caressing the handle of a 357 Magnum. In the small towns they ride around with rifles in the rear window of their pickup trucks. And certain guns are favored by certain groups. People who affect a style sometimes called bikers, almost to a man or woman, carry 45 caliber Army pistols. It is still an unnerving sight to me to be cruising down the freeway alongside someone who looks like one of fates uglier heads personified and see a 45 caliber pistol sticking out of their belt.

I often marvel at all this display; and I wonder just what all these people plan to do with all those guns. I mean, are they really ready to shoot someone in the checkout line at 7-11? And what would you have to believe in order to be ready to do that?

Twisted Fate

In order for this whole frenzy of display to make sense--the nameless terrors and city dreads, the strutting 45s, the gun under my pillow--one must believe that basically things are more or less precisely what they seem. And thus it is a matter of mere reasoning upon the evidence of the dangers all around us. We have only to look and listen, and chart the course of our fate based upon the nightly news and the counsel of our fears. To take up arms, or to a safe place flee, seem then only reasonable things to do. And perhaps they are. I don't know.

What I do know however is that it is folly indeed to think that things are more or less precisely what they seem. That is simply a misdescription of our common experience. What we find when we look at the actual unraveling of our twisted fate is that the whole thing is unexpected. The story of our little destiny is one for which we must wait around to see how it turns out. Bad things do happen to good people. But in no general way is it possible to anticipate what may happen to whom. (And, if you are one of those good people to whom something bad is wont to happen, where can you go that God will not know your forwarding address?)

You cannot discern the contours of your fate by any effort of analysis, expectation, doubt or fear. To anticipate trouble, to fall into the mood of chronic vigilance, is to presume more than you have any right to know. In fact our very appearance in this passion play is for us an event of utter mystery. The universe is a living ongoing process that has been unfolding for eons of time, at some one moment we appear in this process, the universe lives us for a time, and then we disappear. That's really all we know about it. Our fate, in general or in its particulars, is the universe doing us, living us. The whole process is for us an irreducible mystery.

Granted then that we have no real idea how our story is to turn out, no real justification to assume that fate will take us down darkening turns, is it not reasonable still to arm to the teeth--just in case? Well now, that depends.

What if, as some have always claimed, the mystery in which we find ourselves is a divine one? What if it is all the universe unfolding as it should? It then becomes less pat, less confident and clear, that certain fates are to be embraced and others to be shunned. Of course there have always been others who always claimed that the universe grinds away by a combination of sheer chance, mechanical processes of nature, and human folly. There seems much evidence for this view. Perhaps it is wholly true. I don't know. What I do know is that one must cleave to the one model and spurn the other in order for there to be much sense in the posture of guarding against fate. For what is to be resisted in a universe unfolding as it should? Who might I be to suppose I know how the story should turn out--mine or anyone else's?

What I do know is that one must cleave to the one and spurn the other in order for there to be much sense in the posture of guarding against fate. For what is to be resisted in a universe unfolding as it should? Who might I be to suppose I know how the story should turn out--mine or anyone else's? Of course certain story lines please us and others not--that is certainly our privilege. But to take up arms against this turning or that imply that what we see is a universe unfolding in some way other than how it should.

But perhaps I am being too sanguine, glib even, when I speak of being pleased or displeased by The Fates. For surely what we are talking about here are some real horrors; some terribly dark terrors; some screamingly inhuman violations, for which we humans are so well known. What of my friends radiant child? Horrible things could befall her on this earth. And is it not a mothers duty to shield her from harms way--at nearly any cost? Probably so. But several things must be said.

The Drumming In The Heart

Let us give some very specific features to one of the infinity of our possible nightmares. Imagine my friend and her baby alone one night; violent intruders crash through the front door with mayhem coursing in their veins; and my friend stands between them and her child, with her gun in hand, a moment away from spitting fire and death at these unholy fiends. A more grotesque moment would be hard to find, but it is, sad to say, very much within the realm of the possible. Violence offered and violence returned. Seems only right.

But notice what is implied about the relationship between mother and child. To put it naked and cold: Who is the mother, and who does she suppose the child to be, that she knows how the child's story is to read? What if, for instance, the child were in actuality an ancient soul, who has been through this place innumerable times before and who, in consultation with its God, has on this occasion a very definite plan in mind, which mother may or may not apprehend? Is it then so automatic that even a mother should intervene in her child's fate by intervening, gun in hand, in the fate of some other mothers child? Only to the extent that mother sees it as her unique role to be Mother and her child to be Child is she the court of first and last resort, only then can she be sure it is up to her how the tale is to be told.

Of course mothers have an awesome instinct to protect their young. Thank God. And it is this instinct, we all understand, that propels the mother to be prepared for many extremes. But what message does this instinct really drum into her heart? Consider another kind of tragic fate, a natural disaster--say a hurricane. When an inescapable hurricane threatens the safety of her child does the mother fly into a rage, prepared to do any violence to save her child? Probably not, because she understands that there is nothing she can do, she is not in control, this particular line of fate is unraveling with or without her consent; the universe is doing her, she is not doing it. In such a case she is likely to shelter her child the best way she can, with her own body even, recognizing the futility of the gesture, but it is the only gesture she can offer. The drumming in her heart informs her act.

I will suggest that this example reveals just what it is, at its core, that we are genuinely compelled to do as compassionate human beings when faced with ugly Fate. The instinct is to shelter, to protect, to sacrifice if need be, to comfort. It is not to lash out. To lash out presupposes all sorts of other attitudes and beliefs, as we have been seeing. What then are we to say to my friend, when the demons are at the door, and the moment has come? I think her real need is to protect her child, in whatever way she can, with her body, with her life, if need be. Recognizing the likely futility of the gesture; recognizing that it will not come out like she would have it. But her genuine need is not to have it come out like she would have it. It is only to offer whatever aid and comfort she can as we all endure our fates. Her humanity demands no more than that--and possibly no less.

Symbols

There is another matter. The matter of that other mothers child; the one who came crashing through the door, visions of violence gleaming in his eyes. Who is he and how do we look at him that we are ready to put the gleam of violence in our eyes, to match him gleam for gleam? Something must be done, some trick of perception, some assumption of belief, some perfectly angled way to look at things to yield just the right perspective, to make it all crisp and clear, to make our lashing out the only sensible thing to do. I think I know what that trick is.

In order to contemplate shooting someone, for whatever saintly purpose, you must first perceive them as a symbol--as a symbol of Treat To My Child, or Terror In The Night or The Enemy, or simply Evil rearing its ugly head. That other mothers child: as long as we think of him abstractly, as some vague and future threat, then it is easier to think of arming against his appearance. The whole thing becomes a kind of drama in capital letters: Protecting My Child Against The Violent Crazies. But once we take it down to specifics, once we try to imagine a particular violent crazy, see his face, sense his flesh, imagine putting a bullet in his fevered brain, is not so simple anymore.

That is the trick of perception. Unless we see that other as a symbol of some dreaded something, our heart is very likely to break with unbearable sorrow. Sorrow for the whole horrific circumstance. Sorrow for your precious child, sorrow for yourself, and sorrow for the oh so mad soul, like oh so many others, who is about to do you harm because he sees you as a symbol--a symbol of The Privileged or as Someone Who Has What I Want or just simply as Other--and who can therefore contemplate the ravage of your peace without his own heart starting to break.

Reality

Perhaps the worst tendency in all this is the tendency to fictionalize the real gore involved in bullets ripping flesh. We have a banquet of images from movies and television in which people are shot, in almost an abstract way. There is lots of sound and fury of course, and blood and simulated gore, but these fantasy images deliberately never convey anything about what is truly involved here. And you don't even have to get too close to anything too deadly to see the lie.

When I was about 11 years old my father was shot in the butt in a minor hunting accident. He and his two companions were riding in the cab of a pickup truck on their annual deer hunting expedition when they hit a bump and the loaded 30/30 rifle propped on the seat went off, shooting my pop in his posterior. The wound was not life-threatening, the bullet merely tore through his right buttock and zoomed up and out the roof of the truck.

When they got him to the hospital crusty ole Doc DeMarse didn't think it was anything too serious so he just patched him up, loaded him with morphine, and sent him home with a sheet wrapped around his waist.

The terror in the atmosphere at my house was however quite serious. Panic was everywhere in my mothers face as these two unshaven men in hunters togs brought my father in wrapped in a bloody sheet. They put him in bed and quickly left as my mother was forced to cope with six small children and an incapacitated husband.

Once during the night my father tried to get out of bed to go to the bathroom. He was too stoned and too damaged to make it very far and he fell, splat-dab in the middle of the kitchen floor. He couldn't get up again and he lay there helpless and crying as my mother and I tried to pick him up. The wound began to bleed, and there were lit bits of bloody flesh dangling from his butt, like the cotton stuffing starting to come out of a doll. The younger kids began to freak out, some of them crying and others staring in stunned silence. My mother finally went across the street to the house of the County Sheriff who came over and hefted my father back into his bed. Sheriff Pearson stayed for awhile to reassure my mother and try to take some of edge out of the air, and Mrs. Pearson came over the next day to lend some female consolation.

But it was a terrifying experience. It wasn't like the movies. Nobody got shot and then heroically struggled on to best the bad guys. No dramas of sound and motion in which shots ring out and people recoil in dramatic fashion. Nothing romantic or heroic is involved. It is venal and base and filled with unholy gore. And that's what we are about when we contemplate shooting someone.

Also, taking up arms against some future threat turns out not even to be practical. It doesn't even work. The naked truth is that of all those guns under all those pillows, 97% of them, when used, are not used against some intruder, they are used to kill ourselves or another member of our family--either accidentally or deliberately. (84% of the usage involves suicide, 10% murder of a family member, and 3% accidental death of a family member--in case you wondered.) In fact, firearms are one of the leading causes of death for American children--11% die in gun-related incidents. So if you have a gun in your household either it will never be used, or if it is, it will be used to harm your loved ones rather than to protect them.

But of course these are all just facts, and facts speak very faintly to our fears.

The Mood Of Fear

Now, having said all of this, and I mean all of this, let me just add a little final something to make clear what I am not saying. I am not necessarily advocating a limp pacifism. Indeed, I am not advocating any kind of pacifism beyond whatever posture you deem appropriate after contemplating all of these facets of our predicament. In other words, when the thieves are breaking down the door and the ugly moment has come, of course you can grab your baseball bat and dial 911. You can certainly defend yourself when a real attack is at hand. When the energy of the moment is that far out of control, it will do little good to try to talk to your attacker about the finer points of our veil of illusions.

The point of all this stuff is not about how to respond when the thief is at the door; the point is, rather, what posture do you assume in the meantime? Is it appropriate to live in a mood of fear? And if you do, what would you have to believe, how would the world have to look to you, to make this a sensible posture?

And beyond that, perhaps, how do you react when the moment has come? Are you instantly lost in the layers of our illusions? Or can you retain enough presence of mind to do what you have to do without buying-in to the fear and frenzy.

The Human Predicament

This world is in many respects an ugly and savage place. There are real dangers and many threats. There are no guarantees that a safe and happy life will be had by all. There are many opportunities for fear. And yet, fear, in the final analysis, is optional. Alienation is a choice we make moment to moment. You can rise above all the earths fears and threats and savagery and live your life from a place of heart, a place of joy and of peace. And yet, despite all this, you may still fall prey to one of fates uglier turnings. There are no guarantees.