America is flooded with guns — more than 400 million by one count — more than one for every man, woman and child. And the frequency of mass shootings is a distinctly American problem. But there’s little agreement about what to do.
Rhode Island-based author William J. Kole has a new book, In Guns We Trust: The Unholy Trinity of White Evangelicals, Politics, and Firearms, that explores the tightly wound relationship between white evangelicals, politics and guns.
Kole is a longtime journalist and a former worship leader at evangelical churches in Europe and New England. What did he learn about why followers of Jesus Christ embrace guns and, in many cases, take them to church? And does Kole have any hope that Americans can come together to reduce the gun violence in our country?
Kole spoke with Ocean State Media political reporter Ian Donnis to discuss the answers to these questions.
Interview highlights
On what led him to write In Guns We Trust
William J. Kole: I had fairly extensive personal experience with evangelical Christianity. I more or less fell into it at the end of college. I worked as a missionary for a few years, and then kind of slipped back into journalism.
I was a worship leader at a megachurch in Massachusetts when my bass player showed up to practice with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun, and it really blew my socks off. I just couldn’t figure out why someone would come armed to church, you know? And then I quickly learned that many people were carrying weapons, even to church on Sundays. And that set me on a kind of a quest to figure out why. How did this happen in a faith tradition that really is rooted in pacifism?
On acts of violence, and mass shootings, at houses of worship
Kole: There have been mass shootings at houses of worship, for sure. But what there really is here is the myth of the “good guy with a gun.” And this is something that evangelicals really cling to: the idea that the only way to counter the bad guy with a gun is to be the good guy with the gun. And honestly, in practice, it really doesn’t work that way.
Very seldom in an active shooter situation, if you’re a person with a firearm on you, are you able to quell and subdue that person. There’s a reason why law enforcement comes in in droves, dozens of officers in body armor to answer any given active shooter situation. The adrenaline is pumping, the shooter is moving, and if you don’t train a lot with your weapon, the chances of you being successful in stopping that — it’s almost nil.
Some gun rights supporters say that gun restrictions punish law-abiding gun owners
Kole: Look, we’re in this endless cycle of gun violence — we have a uniquely American gun scourge. I lived outside the United States as a foreign correspondent for The Associated Press for the better part of 20 years. You just don’t find this kind of gun violence anywhere else except in the United States.
And yeah, of course, we have a Second Amendment. People have a right to own a weapon and, in some instances, to carry that weapon, either openly or to conceal it with the proper permits. No one is suggesting here — and I’m certainly not suggesting that we disarm the American population — but we’ve got to do something to staunch the bloodshed. It’s just madness. And the idea that we cannot somehow consider amendments to the Second Amendment, or laws supplemental to it, to rein in this problem, is nonsense, frankly.
