Survival Update

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Armed Citizens at Ft. Worth Church Save the Day

Sunday’s shooting at a Christian church in Ft. Worth Texas has provided another instructive example of why gun control as envisioned by liberals is a very bad idea.

A shooter in the church armed with a shotgun killed two people, including the church security guard, and prepared to set upon the more than 240 congregants in attendance.  It could have been a bloody massacre, like the kind we have seen in so many other locales

Instead, two congregants with “concealed and carry” gun permits opened fire and shot the gunman dead.  It was over in a matter of seconds.

Guns in a church?  Most states do allow it, in fact, but it was illegal in Texas until last September when the state legislature passed a law that allows citizens to be armed while attending religious services.

Thank God the legislature acted.  The Texas shooting illustrates the wisdom of that decision.

One of the men that returned fire — and actually killed the gunman — was the church’s chief of security, Jack Wilson.  He’d recently trained the church’s congregant on how to respond to the presence of an active shooter.  In fact, they barely had to.  They ducked down in their pews and with a single shot; the quick-thinking Wilson acted to avert further tragedy

After the incident, Wilson posted on his Facebook page saying the event “put me in a position that I would hope no one would have to be in. But evil exists, and I had to take out an active shooter in church. I’m thankful to GOD that I have been blessed with the ability and desire to serve him in the role of head of security at the church.”

The two men who died were hailed by their families and other congregants for their sacrifice.  One was the church deacon, Anton Wallace, the other, its security guard, Richard White.

White’s daughter-in-law, Misty York White, called him a hero on Facebook: “You stood up against evil and sacrificed your life. Many lives were saved because of your actions. You have always been a hero to us but the whole world is seeing you as a hero now. We love you, we miss you, and we are heartbroken.”

The Texas law allowing citizens to be armed in the church was passed in the aftermath of the deadliest mass shooting in Texas history, which also occurred at a church. In the 2017 massacre at First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs, a man who opened fire on a Sunday morning congregation killed more than two dozen people. He later killed himself.

Currently, just two states ban concealed carry in churches, Nebraska and Louisiana. Nebraska allows a church to authorize an armed security team if the teams members have to carry permits and if written notice is given to church members.

Seven states and the District of Columbia require the permission of a church leader to conceal carry firearms in church.  In 41 other states, carry in churches is treated the same as any other private property.

Of these 41 states, eight are “may issue” states, where the permit-issuing authority can deny the exercise of the Second Amendment for almost any reason.

Those states are California, Delaware, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island. Within these states, the issuance of permits ranges from almost none in Hawaii and New Jersey to fairly large numbers, as in upstate New York and Massachusetts.

After this latest attack, expect many of these states to reconsider their current restrictions.