I am going to pray that we haven’t started another list of communities where we attach them immediately to random acts of unspeakable violence.
We have places like Newtown, Charleston, Aurora, Blacksburg, Killeen, Littleton, Springfield, Orlando, you name it, where violence has broken out, claiming the lives of innocent people at the hands of hideous monsters.
Just two weeks ago, another such monster opened fire in Dallas, killing five police officers. Today? It happened again … in Baton Rouge.
Three officers are dead; several others are wounded.
What I haven’t yet been able to read is anything that starts to explain the motive behind this latest attack on law enforcement.
The big question? Is it race-related?
Baton Rouge police, you must recall, were involved in the shooting death of an African-American man. The officers, who are white, have been put on leave. Demonstrations have broken out.
It’s reasonable, I reckon, to believe that today’s shooting was in response to that earlier incident. But we don’t know.
One gunman is dead. Police today have said he is dressed in black, but no one is identifying him, either by name or by his ethnicity.
No matter the motivation, this kind of attack on law enforcement must not stand.
President Obama has condemned it. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards has as well. So has the leader of the Black Lives Matter movement that has led the demonstrations.
Let us all pray for an immediate end to this kind of tragedy.
I don’t know how we’re ever going to repair hearts that keep getting broken by this kind of cruel senselessness.