Gun control advocates believe that gun owners are vigilantes. People all too ready to use their firearms to solve problems, rather than calling the police or dealing with confrontation in a non-lethal way. This simply isn’t true. American gun owners are peaceable people who only carry a gun to defend their lives against those who would do them or other innocent life harm. They also tend to believe that people in general should be armed. Here’s an example [via fayobserver.com] where an unarmed church pastor defused a potential killer armed with a rifle . . .
Someone had seen a man anxiously pacing outside [Heal the Land Outreach Ministries] before the man with the rifle entered at about 11:40 p.m. as pastor Wright was delivering the sermon.
The man then said to the audience that the Lord had told him he needed to go to church before he did something bad . . .
Wright said the man, who has not been identified by police yet, was carrying the rifle without a clip in one hand and a loaded ammunition clip in the other hand. But, Wright said, he didn’t know if the rifle had a round of ammunition in it.
Wright stepped down quickly from the pulpit when he saw the man, who appeared to be in his late 20s..
The man continued moving toward the front of the church, pointing the rifle into the air.
The two met, near the front of the sanctuary.
“Can I help you?” the pastor asked the man.
Wright, who is a 57-year-old retired soldier, said the man’s answer determined his next action.
“If he was belligerent, I was going to tackle him,” said Wright, who is 6-foot-2 and 230 pounds.
But the stranger was calm, and Wright took the weapon from him. He then patted him down, and the pastor summoned four strong deacons to embrace the disarmed man, in an effort to make him feel welcome.
Wright then prayed for the man, who fell to his knees and began crying.
The man was then invited to sit on the front pew, and Wright resumed the Watch Night service. During the altar call at the conclusion, the man came forward and asked for salvation.
“He gave his life to Christ,” Wright said in an interview Saturday with The Fayetteville Observer.
Someone had called 911, and by the end of the service police had arrived. But Wright said he asked the police to remain outside.
“I didn’t want to interrupt the service,” said the two-term councilman, whose church members call him Bishop Wright . . .
Wright said Fayetteville police were planning to take the man to a mental health facility on Roxie Avenue, but he had no other information about him.
Result. No shots fired. Still, would it have been better if pastor Wright or members of his congregation had been armed? I think so. I believe this story highlights the need for armed self-defense, rather than proving that guns should be controlled or church members be disarmed. You?