TO THE EDITOR:
I read, with some disappointment, in the 3 January 2013 edition Bishop Tobin’s “Gun Ownership is Not an Absolute Right.”
I understand the line that divides church and state is often obscure – and I regret that the article doesn’t add any clarity. As for the title, perhaps the bishop is not familiar with the Second Amendment, which reads: “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Who is the authority that decides “absolute rights” anyway?
Bishop Tobin also uses the phrase “the common good.” Is that in a “Catholic sense,” or in a more secular sense? Who does the Bishop think gets to determine what “the common good” is? Barack Obama? A Catholic ought to leave that determination to God alone. We cannot know, as Catholics, that some seemingly “bad” thing happens for the sake of a greater good. Man often is too narrow sighted to see this, but God can.
The borrowed phrase used by Bishop Tobin in the piece, “Forever banned,” is also troubling. With a wave of what magic wand does the bishop believe we can remove guns, nukes and weapons of mass destruction from the earth? A catchy phrase – but devoid of any understanding of the evil afoot in the world today.
I invite and would love an opportunity to discuss these matters with Bishop Tobin.
Brian Gardner
Jamestown
