SHABBAT ZACHOR GUN VIOLENCE PREVENTION SHABBAT RABBI JONATHAN BLAKE Westchester Reform Temple March 14, 2014 / 13 Adar II 5774! Tonight, for the second year in a row, WRT joins the PICO National Network for community organizing, the Washington National Cathedral, the Auburn Theological Seminary, and Faiths United to Prevent Gun Violence a coalition of nearly 50 denominations and faith-based organizations to reflect, unite and act on the issue of gun violence. We also stand with the Union for Reform Judaism, representing 900 congregations and 1.5 affiliates, and the Religious Action Center for Reform Judaism, our social action and lobbying arm in Washington, D.C. In fact, Rabbi Levy returned this week from the RAC with a delegation of sixteen ninth and tenth graders who directly lobbied legislative aides in the halls of Congress on Monday. Our Reform Movement
has remained outspoken on the issue of gun violence since the 1970 s, three times issuing resolutions on the subject before our assembled congregations at our Biennial Convention, consistently supporting sensible legislative measures to make our country safer and saner: making it harder for criminals to obtain firearms and restricting military grade firearms to military use while guns used for hunting or personal security remain accessible to properly licensed users. Finally, WRT stands here tonight with the other community institutions that comprise Westchester United, our local community organizing initiative, now in its fifth year, a coalition of faith-based and civic organizations committed to building a better Westchester through advocacy and the thoughtful exercise of citizens power. Tonight at WRT we re-commit ourselves to the holy and necessary work of reducing and preventing gun violence in America. This Gun Violence Prevention Sabbath is also a special Sabbath on the Jewish calendar. It is Shabbat Zachor, literally, the Sabbath of Remembering. Always immediately before Purim, which this year begins tomorrow at sundown,
Shabbat Zachor is the sober to Purim s silly, the tears to Purim s laughter. On Shabbat Zachor, we perform a ritually commanded act of remembering, following this passage from Deuteronomy: Zachor et Amalek. Remember what the Amalekites did to you on your way out of Egypt, how, when you were weary and worn out, they met you on your journey and attacked all who were lagging behind. They had no fear of God! You must blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven. Do not forget! (Deut. 25:17-19). Recalling Amalek, archenemy of the Biblical Israelites, ancestor of the wicked Haman of the Purim story, we vow to remember his people s treachery and never again to sanction senseless bloodshed. So in the spirit of Shabbat Zachor, this Sabbath of Remembering, tonight we remember: Aurora. Binghamton. Columbine. Dekalb. Fort Hood. Garden City. Killeen. Newtown. Oakcreek. Tucson. Virginia Tech. Watkins Glen. And we remember that most of the more than 42,000 American deaths at the end of a gun since the shooting at
Sandy Hook 1, have happened not in public massacres but in the commission of lesser crimes, in street conflicts and gang wars and drug deals, in convenience store robberies, in domestic disputes, and, especially, in suicides and accidents. When I spoke about this topic last March, I focused primarily on three legislative objectives: 1) That universal background checks should be utilized in every gun sale, and that loopholes in our current federal system of background checks should be closed. 2) That high-capacity weapons and ammo clips should be banned, as no legitimate self-defense or sporting purpose exists for military-style weaponry. And 3) That gun trafficking should be made a federal crime. As everyone now knows, Congress seems most interested in doing nothing at all. Federal gun legislation is now a lifeless carcass and we have not heard anything from the Obama administration to suggest any interest in resurrecting it. No one in Washington seems to have the spine, or perhaps it is the 1 CDC estimate as of March 11, 2014, as cited on http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/ 2012/12/gun_death_tally_every_american_gun_death_since_newtown_sandy_hook_shooting.html
stomach, to to take on the NRA and its supporters. And another year has passed. Does this mean that we are giving up? Shabbat Zachor would have us answer: never. We cannot give up when there s an Amalek on the loose the enemy hellbent on bloodshed when America has more guns and more gun deaths than any other country in the developed world. 88 guns per 100 people and 10 gun-related deaths per 100,000 people, to be specific. Japan, in contrast, has only.6 guns per 100 people and.06 gun-related deaths per 100,000 people, making it the country with both the fewest guns per capita and the fewest gun-related deaths. 2 We cannot give up when Georgia state lawmakers may soon pass the Safe Carry Protection Act, a law that would not only expand Georgia s stand your ground law but would also: - Remove the fingerprinting requirement for gun license renewals As reported on September 19, 2013 on http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2013/09/19/u-s-has-more- 2 guns-and-gun-deaths-than-any-other-country-study-finds/
- Prohibit the state from keeping a gun license database - Prohibit detaining someone for the sole purpose of checking whether they have a gun license, and on and on and on. 3 We cannot give up when a sensible cause supported by a majority of Americans has been maligned and distorted by powerful political interests. We cannot give up when nonsensical phrases like, Guns don t kill people; people do, are used to cover up a glaring truth, supported by mountains of statistical evidence: that in places where access to guns runs rampant, so do gun deaths, and that in places with sensible restrictions on firearms, gun violence diminishes. It s really that simple. So we re not giving up. In our community organizing work, we ask this question: when we focus only on legislators and legislation when it comes to gun violence, whom are we letting off the hook? There are two answers. 1. The companies that manufacture guns. As reported on March 14, 2014 on http://www.salon.com/2014/03/13/ 3 georgia_legislature_considers_repealing_basically_all_gun_laws/
2. The institutions in American life who purchase the most guns. To wit, the mayors, police chiefs, governors, military leaders, and federal officials who buy firearms in vast quantities 40% of all guns in America, to be specific to supply our police forces and our military. First and foremost, in this approach, we have to build demand for reforms to how guns are manufactured. My friend Rabbi Joel Mosbacher, who spoke to our congregation last year and who leads this effort from his pulpit in Mahwah, New Jersey, recently traveled to Europe with fellow leaders from New Jersey Together, a community organizing coalition that corresponds to our Westchester United. After seeking meetings with top gun manufacturers Glock in Austria, Sig Bauer in Germany, and Beretta in Italy, and despite being rebuffed and redirected at every turn, Rabbi Mosbacher did report a few findings of note last month. First, that smart gun technology is real and possible. We have the ability to create firearms that can only their owners can fire, through sophisticated grip- and fingerprint-recognition technologies.
What doesn t yet exist is the demand or the economic incentives to invest in mass production of smart guns. We also believe that manufacturers can create more responsible distribution systems for their products, just as drug companies do, so that guns and ammunition are sold only through retailers committed to high standards of security and record-keeping. Gun companies could create responsible buyback programs and other measures to reduce the number of second-hand guns sold and trafficked in America. They could take specific measures to keep military-grade products out of the hands of civilians. Here Mosbacher adds, Not one of these steps is onerous or prohibitively expensive not one violates the Constitution. 4 The second part of this approach leverages the purchasing power of America s biggest gun buyers police departments, military personnel, and executive branch officials at all levels to initiate productive discussions with gun 4 Gun Violence in America, Sermon delivered on Yom Kippur 5774, as cited on http:// www.bethhaverim.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/ykam5774.pdf
manufacturers and distributors. After all, these guns are purchased with our tax money. Here in Westchester, we ve been working with local chiefs of police, asking them to sign a Gun Safety Covenant. Specifically, we have invited our local chiefs of police to join us in asking the CEOs of gun makers and retailers to meet the responsibilities of safe manufacture and distribution, and to evaluate purchasing of weapons and ammunition not only in light of the firearms technical quality but also in light of how fully these purchases serve the goal of a safer and more secure community. I am happy to report that our meeting with Scarsdale Chief of Police John Brogan, who also currently serves as President of the Westchester County Chiefs of Police Association, met with support and that Chief Brogan has been joining us at key strategy meetings. Tonight is Shabbat Zachor. If we do not remember the victims of senseless bloodshed if we do not remember Amalek, our tradition s personification of wanton destruction we will be doomed to suffer at his hands, perpetually.
Let us then remember what the President said at the interfaith prayer vigil at Sandy Hook on December 16th, 2012 two days after the shooting: [C]an we truly say, as a nation, that we are meeting our obligations? Can we honestly say that we re doing enough to keep our children all of them safe from harm? Can we claim, as a nation, that we re all together there, letting them know that they are loved, and teaching them to love in return? Can we say that we re truly doing enough to give all the children of this country the chance they deserve to live out their lives in happiness and with purpose? I ve been reflecting on this the last few days, and if we re honest with ourselves, the answer is no. We re not doing enough. And we will have to change. 5 We remember those words, Mr. President, on this Sabbath of Remembering. Do you? 5 Transcript: Obama s Speech at Sandy Hook Interfaith Prayer Vigil, as cited on http://blogs.wsj.com/ washwire/2012/12/16/transcript-obamas-speech-at-sandy-hook-interfaith-prayer-vigil/