Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. urges students to arm themselves

A year or so ago, Georgia changed the law to allow guns in churches if the church had a policy to allow them. Every church has to decide what their policy is and until that policy is defined, guns cannot be legally carried into the church. If you carry a gun into a church without an official policy that it is OK, it is against the law. That would apply to my church which has no official policy. There are a few people there that are qualified to carry guns and do and I make no issue of it even though we have no official policy. But I am uncomfortable with the idea that anyone that wants to bring a gun to church should do so. That is frankly borderline absurd.

…I don’t know for sure if anyone is carrying during service times.

I do know that we have several police officers and at least one FBI agent who are regular attendees.

If any of the above are carrying when present at my church, I have no problem with that.

One thing of note here, regarding Joe. B’s comments, is that again we must note that not only are carry permit holders not trained like LEOs, they also are not required to act like them. Hence certain gaps of training that would be critical for a LEO are not important for a carry permit holder. For example, under the four rules I presented above, you can expect that a carry permit holder would only engage if he could not retreat without risking someone’s life, and would only be shooting at targets where he (a) knew what was behind them and (b) were within about thirty feet of him. That’s a big part of why you don’t have problems with carry permit holders—the rules of engagement simply militate that most will not make contact with another permit holder, even though there are several million of them.

And that’s why LEOs have much higher accident rates than do carry permit holders; they ARE required to engage when practical, which means that from time to time they will end up shooting someone who looked like they were up to no good, but were not engaged in an actual crime.

One other note regarding statistics of defensive uses of firearms vs. accidents is that the statistics referred to do not count defensive uses of firearms where the gun was not fired—really they’re counting dead perps vs. gun accidents. When the DOJ counted the cases where the gun was wielded but not fired, the number of defensive uses went from hundreds or thousands to nearly a million. As every LEO knows, just because he didn’t fire the weapon doesn’t mean it wasn’t useful in that situation.

Regarding whether it’s wise to carry in church, my take is that it depends. Are you working with kids who might have their hands all over you? Best not to carry. Serving as an usher or security person? Might be useful. I know of a church where it’s encouraged among the security staff. No problems that I’m aware of.

Should you carry when visiting a church? It depends. Is it legal? Does the church welcome permit holders? Do you need to go into areas with children’s ministries? Keep in mind that children’s ministries tend to be classified like daycares and are off limits for permit holders unless church leadership designates you as a security officer.

All in all, I tend to treat churches the same way I treat stores. If they post “no guns”, they are telling the whole world that I am unable to defend myself if someone decides to assault me or others. I tend to stay away unless the case for doing business with that store (church) is really compelling—and by the way, I am not currently a carry permit holder.

That leads to why concealed carry works; it is not because a perpetrator knows someone will shoot back. Only 3% or so of adults have a permit, and probably less than 1% carry routinely in the places they can. Rather, it is the uncertainty of wondering whether someone might fight back—and the round will be coming from a totally unexpected direction.

Put differently, there is a fairly complicated decision tree out there, but it’s one that I felt comfortable navigating when I had my permit. And yes, I did carry in church from time to time.

1: “TOWN OF BROOKFIELD, Wis. —A loaded gun was found inside a church in the Town of Brookfield last week.

According to a police report, a church staff member found the gun in a bathroom at Elmbrook Church on March 19 and approached a security guard.

Elmbrook Church told WISN 12 News a service for home-schooled elementary children was going on at the time, and the bathroom where the gun was found was accessible to those children.

An Oconomowoc woman who had been at the church for Bible study called later looking for the weapon, saying she had put it down to use the restroom and forgot it.

The church said the gun’s safety was on, and no one was hurt.

In a statement the church said, “We do not restrict the ability to lawfully carry a weapon. We take the safety and security of our members and guests very seriously and believe that our internal protocols were followed and served to protect those in attendance that morning. No children were in the immediate area at the time of the incident.”

Police said they have referred the case to the Waukesha County District Attorney’s Office.

The District Attorney’s Office told WISN News it has sent a letter to the woman giving her an opportunity for a pre-charging conference.”

http://www.wisn.com/news/loaded-gun-found-in-town-of-brookfield-church/…

2. “A North Carolina man was cited after leaving a loaded handgun in a church restroom, where a child found the weapon.

Claude Lee Haynes III is accused of leaving a loaded Equinox .380 pistol in a stall after Sunday services at Lifewalk Church in Holly Ridge, reported the Jacksonville Daily News.

The 70-year-old Haynes apparently had been asked by the church to carry a weapon to prevent against possible attacks, investigators said.

“It’s kind of a prevalent thing going on,” said John Maiorano, chief of Holly Ridge police.

The 4-year-old boy’s father went into the bathroom stall and took the gun away from his son before he could fire the weapon, police said.

Haynes received a ticket for child endangerment.

“He understood the severity of it,” Maiorano said. “A 4-year-old is just nowhere old enough to be within reach of a gun.”

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/08/nc-church-member-designated-as-armed-gu…

3. “BONITA SPRINGS, Fla.- A mom called 911 over the weekend when her young son came home from church with a gun.

People at Gospel Baptist Church are reeling after learning the 9-year-old boy reported finding a gun in a men’s bathroom Sunday.

“My first reaction was shock that anybody would lose a weapon,” said Pastor William Lytell.

Pastor Lytell says a Lee County Sheriff’s deputy told him the weapon was taken home by the 9-year-old and given to his mother who immediately called authorities.

“For a bad situation, this is the best thing that could happen,” said Lytell.

If the gun turns out to belong to a church member, “then I will very specifically, and we as a church will very specifically, tell that individual not to ever carry a weapon at Gospel Baptist.”

The pastor says he doesn’t know the name of the boy who found the gun, but he’s just relieved nobody got hurt.

“Thirty-five years being here, I helped to start this church, and I never had anything like this. It’s a first,” said Lytell.

The church says it’s been told that it will take a few days for deputies to enter the weapon into evidence. Then the rightful owner can come, with proper documents, to identify the gun and possibly get it back.

http://www.winknews.com/2015/03/16/police-boy-finds-gun-in-bonita-sprin…

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In each instance, the gun was found in a church bathroom…..

Here’s a story about the Capitol police apparently having a habit of leaving their guns in the bathroom. Everybody needs to mind their ps and qs on this.

So, is the common denominator the gun or the bathroom?

…well, “The King” (Elvis) died on “the throne”, so I would dare say that bathrooms are very dangerous and lethal. I’ll be “holding it” until the problem is solved. :^)

Seriously, we simply all need to understand that there are risks, and we try to choose the lesser risk and take reasonable precautions for handling them.

…but I did find a clip full of what looked to be .32 rounds on the floor at the Mall of America a few years ago. I stood with one foot over it as another person went and came back with one of the Mall’s security guards to retrieve it.

[Larry Nelson]

…but I did find a clip full of what looked to be .32 rounds on the floor at the Mall of America a few years ago. I stood with one foot over it as another person went and came back with one of the Mall’s security guards to retrieve it.

Note that the MOA is a posted no gun zone, and .32 caliber is a favored firearm (along with .25 caliber) for gangbangers because they’re cheap. If you have to throw it away because the police are coming, it doesn’t hurt as bad. Larry probably found something left behind by someone who wasn’t exactly going shopping, if you catch my drift.

As some of our SI commentators have said - I am the greater threat than a terrorist. Yikes - that is kind of frightening to actually write out!

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/12/08/maine-school-official-apologizes-f…

​I don’t expect any apologies from our commentators though.

[Greg Long]

Greg, we are not talking about homes, we are talking about churches. Don’t you think there are a few factors that are involved in home gun usage that affect those statistics, such as:

• Children finding loaded guns
• Accidents involving guns being cleaned
• Suicides
• Domestic violence (yes of course that COULD happen at church, but very rarely does)

So statistics involving home gun usage have little bearing on the discussion. The very specific discussion we are having involves an intruder intending to shoot people, because that’s what Falwell was referring to.

Of course there’s a chance the things you mentioned could happen. I still feel safer with concealed weapons allowed in church, and I appreciate that you differ. Thanks for the interaction.

I have a number of guns, and I am not in favor of banning weapons. With that said, many people that I know in church who carry a gun have very little common sense. First example, is that I know a few people who like to carry .45 because that will really stop the bad guys. The problem is that they have 1) no training, and 2) you don’t use a .45 for self-defense in a crowded area with civilians. There is a high chance that every single bullet fired will exit the intruder and strike an innocent life and most likely end their life. I tell them that they need to use a much lower caliber, but they don’t listen. Second example, we were over at a elders house for church fellowship and he thought it was cool to bring out his collection of assault rifles. A few of the other church members thought it was cool, yet we had kids running around, bolts weren’t open and even some kids were touching them. Absolutely no common sense. I run into more of these examples than I would ever care to run into.

[Bob Nutzhorn]

As some of our SI commentators have said - I am the greater threat than a terrorist. Yikes - that is kind of frightening to actually write out!

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/12/08/maine-school-official-apologizes-fo…

​I don’t expect any apologies from our commentators though.

No, I won’t apologize. Question for you Bob. In the past five years, how many people were killed in the US by terrorists and how many were killed by gun accidents caused by gun owners?

Milwaukee County Sheriff, David Clarke, recommends that civilians receive training and arm themselves rather than waiting for the police to arrive.

https://youtu.be/-8TCx-sM1vw