Sarah Milgrim and Yaron Lischinsky

The recent murder of two Israeli embassy aides continues a now established pattern among leftist activists to resort to violence to advance or bring attention to their causes. This does not mean that their causes are illegitimate. It means that the methods they have chosen to advance or bring attention to their causes are violent ones.

The killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers in May of 2020 set off a string of riots in a number of cities across the country. Despite CNN and other news outlets repeatedly insisting that the protests were “mostly peaceful,” these were violent riots in which acts of arson, vandalism, and looting added up to an estimated $1 – $2 billion in damages, making it the most costly episode of civil unrest in American history, surpassing the Los Angeles riots of 1992, which were inspired by the beating of Rodney King by a group of LAPD officers. Worse, the riots resulted in the direct deaths of at least 25 people, and possibly the indirect deaths of more (including people who eventually succumbed to injuries suffered in the riots). Apparently their lives didn’t matter. According to PR Newswire, there were 574 violent riots in 2020, resulting in over 2000 police officers being injured across the country.

Those on the left will quickly retort with remembrances of January 6, 2021. January 6 was a black day in American history. Never before had America’s own citizens turned against the Capitol Building, the symbol of our democracy and the center of our Legislative Branch of government. But, the truth is, no where near the number of people died at the Capitol that day as did in the riots of 2020, and there was no where close to the amount of property damange or ruined businesses. Most daming of all is the fact that the FBI knew about the plans to attack the Capitol Building and informed the Capitol Police about it. Neither did anything to prevent the attack from happening. The deaths and destruction of that day, then, are at least shared by the FBI and Capitol Police.

But even though right-wing extremism gets more press, and left-wing extremism is often not even identified as “extremism,” the majority of incidents of violent extremism in recent years have come from the left. Many of the attacks have been on police, such as the September 12, 2020 ambush killing of two police officers in Los Angeles. Others have been on Republican politicians, such as the attempted assassination of Rep. Steve Scalise on June 14, 2017 and, of course, two attempts on the life of Donald Trump (only one has been confirmed as instigated by a left-wing activist). Organizations that support pro-life causes have suffered dozens of attacks, including firebombings, of pro-life pregnancy centers and over 300 attacks on Catholic churches in recent years, mostly by those angered at the overthrow of Roe v. Wade. Because these attacks on pro-life pregnancy centers and Catholic churches have not caused any deaths and rarely cause even injuries to persons, they’re not counted in official reports of domestic terrorism, though there’s no question about their intent to intimidate. Violence committed by individuals attacking pro-lifers on college campuses, or on the streets of our cities, tossing over their displays or even physically assaulting them, don’t often find their way on television news.

Antifa is a left-wing group that is responsible for violence and threats of violence, including the shooting death of a right-wing Trump supporter in Oregon. The Antifa activist who killed the Trump supporter was himself killed by federal agents under circumstances that raised questions about whether or not he had produced a firearm when the agents approached.

Campus protests led by supporters of Palestinians in Gaza, and some who even support Hamas, have taken control of university and college campuses, often threatening and limiting the freedom of movement of Jewish students, or otherwise making it very uncomfortable for supporters of Israel.

Leftists have taken to setting fire to Teslas to protest Elon Musk’s effort to save American taxpayers money by eliminating waste in government spending. One would think eliminating waste would be good thing, but I guess people have different ideas on what constitutes waste.

Then there was the murder of Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealthcare by Luigi Mangione. Mangione has become something of a folk hero on the left, receiving a lot of money for his defense and, partly because the guy he murdered represented all that people hate about corporate American and partly because of his good looks, inspiring a weird admiration. Now we have two young Israeli embassy aides murdered in cold blood by a man who shouted “Free, free Palestine!” After shooting them both and their collapsing to the ground, the man reloaded and shot them again and again at point blank range. The two young people were a man and a woman who had walked out of a Jewish Museum and were planning on soon getting engaged to each other. Some of the comments to the story include the most vile sentiments (but, of course, it’s social media, where cowards can speak their truth without consequence). Some are calling Elias Rodriguez, the suspect in the shooting, a hero. Another referred to the murdered couple as a “homemade Zionist salad.” Another wrote of Rodriguez, “what a brave man well done may god give him high grade in heaven,” while still another referred to the murder as “Vermin extermination.”

Why are people resorting to violence? Clearly they have become convinced that their cause is so righteous that it justifies even killing the innocent. There is a level of mental and emotional instability in these people. They regard themselves as above the law, above the expectations of common decency and civilized behavior. No, the cause they support is too great, too important, too immediate to rely on traditional routes of political action and social protest. People must be forced to listen and forced to take action, so extreme measures are called for and justified. What is the death of one person, or even a couple dozen, against the injustice of a system or the impact of a crisis that is going to kill us all?

And what does the violence achieve? Nothing but the deaths and injuries of those in the path of the deranged minds and hearts of the extremist. No healthy person ever said, “Wow, I’m so impressed with this person killing (whoever) that I’m going to take action now to support their cause!” To react in such a way would precisely define one as an unhealthy person. And, while there are plenty of emotionally and spiritually unstable people out there, their numbers are yet too small, and their inability to act responsibly and organize meaningfully prevents the violence from ever achieving the goal it set out to achieve. So, nothing comes of it except heartache.

I cannot resist the notion (mostly because I believe it to be true) that part of the root of this violence is the absence of God in the lives of so many of our contemporaries. When God is not even on one’s radar, it’s easier to justify violence and commit violence, because one’s sense of righteousness is all one has to rely on. There is no objective moral truth to tell them that what they are contemplating is wrong, what they are planning is immoral. They fail to distinguish between the cause they oppose and the people who support the cause they oppose. The cause is unjust, so the people are unjust. The cause is a canker on the moral soul of the country, so too the people who support it. The cause is objectified, labeded as an evil in the body politic, and so are the people who support that cause objectified and labeled as an evil in the body politic. And what do we do with evil? Do we tolerate it? Do we make room for it to employ its First Amendment rights, give it a listen, and then make sound arguments against it? No. We stamp it out, or try to. So when we identify the people who support what we perceive to be an evil cause as evil themselves, it’s not a long leap to justify stamping them out.

Addressing people respectfully who think differently than we do would require too much energy and time. Energy is better put toward supporting the “right” ideas, and time is of the essence. We were told by AOC back in 2019 that we only had twelve years left to save the world from climate crisis. Well, six of those years have passed, so we’re half way to doomsday by now. Why is no one taking action? “I will force them to take action!” says the extremist. It isn’t so much his or her ideas that are extreme, though there is plenty of that, it’s the means and methods they are willing to employ to make their ideas a reality.

This is not the peace of Christ. Why are we not teaching our children that violence is not an option? Why are we not teaching our children productive and meaningful ways to make political and social progress? Why are we not teaching our children basic civilized behavior? Why are we not more involved in the lives of our children to protect them from exposure to extreme movements and attitudes, helping them discern right from wrong and when even those supporting a just cause have gone off the cliff into unreason and irresponsibility, into hatred and violence? Luigi Mangione did not grow up in a vacuum. Elias Rodriguez did not grow up in a vacuum. They came from families, famillies that presumably loved them, cared for them, gave them a home and a place to share their ideas with others who were more mature and could help them form those ideas as mature, well-developed people. Or, maybe they didn’t. I don’t know. But something went horribly wrong. The fact that Mangione is an Italian name and Rodriguez an Hispanic name, and that these two ethnic groups are traditionally Catholic is disconcerting. Not so much because they likely grew up Catholic as because they likely didn’t. Why did the faith that so permeated those cultures not permeate these men? Would it have made a difference if they grew up in strong Catholic homes where gospel virtues were valued. I think so, yes. But their heritage doesn’t necessarily mean that they did so. I read once that Pope Pius XII was very distraught over the fact that Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco all came from Catholic homes. But, based on what I’ve read, those homes were not seriously Catholic. It does make a difference.

So what can we do? We can’t do anything about those who are already out of our reach. But we can make a huge difference on those who still are. The place to start is with our own children and grandchildren, and the children we may have a chance to impact if we are teachers, priests, deacons, religious, doctors, therapists, coaches. We can impact these children, raise them in an environment where God is real and not just a cultural convenience, where respect for others, especially for others who think differently than we do, is a matter of course, and where violence as a means toward an end is never an option. It is all we can do, but it is something. In fact, it’s a big thing.

Be Christ for all. Bring Christ to all. See Christ in all.