There are NO GUN RIGHTS - only Human Rights - and one of them is the right to self defense

I believe that the right to self-defense, to keep and bear arms, is under a deliberate, growing assault. One of our greatest allies in standing against this assault is precision of language.

In an age of sound bites and agenda driven news reports, the architects of a new cultural order have slipped one more phrase into the modern lexicon which we adopt at our own peril. The phrase is Gun Rights.  Guns have no rights. People do. Rights are goods of human persons. Human Rights come not from a civil government but from God. The Right at issue is the Right to Self Defense. Civil Rights are those rights recognized by the Civil Government and properly protected.

WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - I am increasingly concerned that we use precise language as we face the challenges presented by a collapsing western culture. The word "rights" is now routinely misused in an effort to make immoral behavior seem commendable - while fundamental human rights are increasingly being denied.

My purpose in writing is not to enter into the debate referred to in shorthand as "gun control". Good people can and do have differing opinions on the legitimate concerns which this debate brings up. My purpose is to clarify the language and set the issue in context for Catholics and Christians of other confessions or communities.

As citizens we should approach all of the issues we face in a culture losing its moral compass as Christians first. However, too many Catholics and other Christians consider the various arguments surrounding a controversy, choose one they agree with, and then just jump in. That includes using the sloppy or loaded language of contemporary argumentation.  

With the popular misuse of the word "conscience" as a kind of synonym for personal opinion or feelings, Christians are making some very serious errors which could have serious consequences. Consciences can be uninformed, poorly formed, deformed, or become darkened and lead us to a confused state where we wander in our own land of Nod, East of Eden, following in the footsteps of Cain.  (See, Gen. 4:16)

We are called to form our conscience in accordance with the truth. That truth can be known. It is revealed in the Natural Law, expounded upon in the Bible and Christian Tradition and taught by the  the Church. We live in a challenging time in the United States of America. Many are properly concerned about the growing infringement of the rights delineated in the First Amendment Bill of Rights to the United States Constitution.

One of those Rights is addressed in 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." However, what we actually call the right which is referred to in this amendment will have a huge influence on our capacity to keep it and defend it.

Only Human Persons Have Rights

In an age of sound bites and agenda driven news reports, the architects of a new cultural order have slipped one more phrase into the modern lexicon which we adopt at our own peril. The phrase is Gun Rights.  Guns have no rights. People do.

Rights are goods of human persons. Human Rights come not from a civil government but from God. The Right at issue is the Right to Self Defense. Civil Rights are those rights recognized by the Civil Government and properly protected. Again, Human Rights do not come from the government.

Let me give just two examples.

Over the course of our ongoing human and civil rights struggle to protect our youngest neighbors in the womb from being intentionally killed through procured abortions we have experienced the lethal power of words. The "Right to Life" is confirmed by the Natural Law and medical science. The child in the womb is our first neighbor. It is always and everywhere wrong to kill our innocent neighbors.It is a denial of the "Right to Life".

The counterfeit phrase "Abortion Rights" was manufactured by cultural revolutionaries who oppose the REAL Right, the fundamental Human "Right to Life". They also inserted it into the lexicon of the culture struggle with a nefarious purpose in mind. The Complicit Media has adopted the shorthand language of these architects of a culture of death.

Procured Abortions are always deadly acts. Such acts have no "rights". Only human persons have rights. The first of which is always violated in every procured abortion because an innocent child is always killed. Sadly, even some in the Christian media have adopted the misguided language, actually using the profane phrase "abortion rights". In so doing, they may be helping to propound the evil which has been unleashed.

The same sort of verbal sleight of hand is now routinely used by those who oppose marriage. The leaders of the homosexual equivalency movement want a social order where homosexual sexual practices are approved by the State, and declared by the State to be morally equivalent to the sexual expression of marital love between a man and a woman.

They demand that homosexual and lesbian relationships, which are objectively incapable of achieving the true ends of marriage, now be given the same legal status as a marriage. They use the police power of the State to advance their cultural revolution. Anyone who agrees with what the Natural Moral Law confirms - and what the cross cultural history of Nations has long affirmed - that marriage is solely possible between one man and one woman, intended for life and formative of family, now faces growing hostility and increasingly overt persecution.

This is only the beginning. The phrase "sexual rights" is now being foisted upon the public as the newest buzz phrase. It is being used by the architects of the Cultural Revolution, along with the loaded language of what is called "gender identity", which stands for the rejection of the gift of our sexual differentiation and insistence upon the insane notion that we can somehow change our gender at whim. We are at the beginning of a wave which will lead to further moral and social degradation.

Part of our defense should be the recovery of the proper language of human rights and the clarity of our own defense of those rights in the public square.

Guns have No Rights, People Do

A similar verbal pattern to what we have seen used to undermine the Right to Life and demean and degrade the truth about marriage is emerging in the debate concerning the Second Amendment and governmental efforts to regulate the purchase and use of guns for self-defense.

I do not own a gun. However, I have nothing against gun ownership.

I believe that gun ownership is unquestionably protected by the explicit words found in the Second Amendment to the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. I may choose to own a gun in the future if the trends which have been unleashed in the nation I love continue. Trends which I fear increasingly threaten a proper understanding of ordered liberty and limited government.

I am concerned that some Christians who are attempting to weigh in on this social issue are falling prey to another media tactic when they use the phrase "Gun Rights". Guns have no rights, only people do. And, Yes, one of them is the Right to defend yourself, your family, your property and your neighbor.

You may be asking, "Is this all simply a matter of semantics?"  I insist it is not! The pattern is the same one which was used to undermine the defense of the Right to Life and the Defense of True Marriage. Incorrectly framing the debate by changing the language in order to undermine the true right is a tactic of cultural and social engineers.

Part III of the Catechism of the Catholic Church is entitled Life in Christ. There we can find helpful exposition on the Fifth Commandment, "You Shall Not Kill". Christians who seek to enter into the debate surrounding what is often called gun control could find some great assistance here. The paragraphs fall under a heading of "legitimate defense" and are set forth below.

Legitimate Defense

2263 The legitimate defense of persons and societies is not an exception to the prohibition against the murder of the innocent that constitutes intentional killing. "The act of self-defense can have a double effect: the preservation of one's own life; and the killing of the aggressor. . . . The one is intended, the other is not."

2264 Love toward oneself remains a fundamental principle of morality. Therefore it is legitimate to insist on respect for one's own right to life. Someone who defends his life is not guilty of murder even if he is forced to deal his aggressor a lethal blow:

If a man in self-defense uses more than necessary violence, it will be unlawful: whereas if he repels force with moderation, his defense will be lawful. . . . Nor is it necessary for salvation that a man omit the act of moderate self-defense to avoid killing the other man, since one is bound to take more care of one's own life than of another's.

2265 Legitimate defense can be not only a right but a grave duty for one who is responsible for the lives of others. The defense of the common good requires that an unjust aggressor be rendered unable to cause harm. For this reason, those who legitimately hold authority also have the right to use arms to repel aggressors against the civil community entrusted to their responsibility.

These sections of the Catechism of the Catholic Church should be read and studied by Catholics - and any other Christian concerned with the real threat we face in this area. The text also contains footnotes to Bible passages, from both the Old and New Testament, as well as insights offered by the great Saint Thomas Aquinas.

We need this kind of input! Not only to inform our understanding, but to help us make our defense in the public square effectively. I believe that the right to self-defense, to keep and bear arms, is under a deliberate, growing assault. One of our greatest allies in standing against this assault is precision of language.

It is Time to Change the language

Catholics, other Christians, and other people of good will who share my concern need to watch our words. What we must protect is the Right to Self Defense and the Defense of others. One of the means we may have to use involves the ownership of guns. The Right to Self Defense is vested in us - not in those objects we use - to be used if and when it may be necessary. Guns are merely instruments.

There is no question that the Second Amendment to the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution protects the Right to keep and bear arms. The text, and the interpretation of it found in the judicial precedent, is clear. However, the larger issue should remain the focus of our contribution to this important debate. Our language matters! Only human persons have rights.

There are no Gun Rights, only Human Rights, and one of them is the right to self-defense. It is time to rise to its defense!

-----
Deacon Keith A. Fournier is Founder and Chairman of Common Good Foundation and Common Good Alliance. A married Roman Catholic Deacon of the Diocese of Richmond, Virginia, he and his wife Laurine have five grown children and seven grandchildren, He is a constitutional lawyer and public policy advocate who served as the first and founding Executive Director of the American Center for Law and Justice in the nineteen nineties. He has long been active at the intersection of faith, values and culture.He currently serves as Special Counsel to Liberty Counsel.

---

'Help Give every Student and Teacher FREE resources for a world-class Moral Catholic Education'

Copyright 2021 - Distributed by Catholic Online