Birmingham-Southern To Help After Fires

Like most, I was shocked to learn the identities of the three people involved in the Alabama church fires. I wasn't shocked that they were young white men. I was once a young white man and I know how capable of stupidity we are. I was more shocked at the seeming randomness of the whole thing. At such times, one wonders what happened. Why did three guys who should have been content feel the need to burn churches "as a joke?" It seems to add to the level of cynicism in our world.

So it was encouraging to hear about the response of the college they attended, Birmingham-Southern. Rather than see themselves as detached from this incident, they see those guys as part of their community. In their minds, this implies that they are obligated to play some role in the reconciliation and recontruction. Here is this morning's NY Times article on this: At College, Moral Obligations Are Felt on Church Burnings - New York Times.

Keith Thompson, Birmingham-Southern's VP for institutional advancement, said the following: "This was a bit of a kick in the gut," he said. "Something like this is so contrary to what Birmingham-Southern is about. Still, if we are going to take the credit for the great accomplishments of so many of our alumni, we have to be prepared to take some responsibility for our current students when something like this happens."

In an age of no-fault insurance and product liability lawsuits, what would it be like if we all saw ourselves as responsible for each other's actions, including helping to restore situations after mistakes have been made by others? To make it more specific, what would the world look like if the Church of Jesus Christ saw themselves as responsible for the actions of other church members?

Comments

[James]

I don't know, but I'm quite sure it would be shockingly, drastically, gloriously different.

[Ken]

From The Birmingham Times, "In a statement about the arrests, Birmingham-Southern President David Pollick said the social use of alcohol "moves easily and too frequently to dangerous irresponsibility."

"Innocent and healthy stages of interpersonal social encounters too frequently degrade to violent and personal acts of violation," he said.

Wadda dee say?

Too frequently? People get drunk all the time and rarely burn down a church. Unless they are sick or very superior beings.

These sociopaths burned one down as a joke and conspired to burn eight more to confuse the investigation. That's criminal conspiracy to commit a felony. What a joy that by setting the other fires they aided the police in capturing them.

They are going to make a lot of prisoners very happy men. I hope for a long time.

[jodie]

i first read about these three kids with my jaw dropped open. two are from my hometown, we even graduated from the same high school. two went to the same college as my brother. it is sad, but i don't want to point my high and mighty finger at these young men. i don't want to blame it on how they were raised. they certainly can make their own decisions. i appreciate your thoughts will on sharing responsibility for each other's actions and helping to restore the situation. my thoughts are mixed. burning a church or churches is definitely not on the top of my list for a good prank. but then how can we lovingly help restore this situation? i guess that if i was in charge i would make sure these young men are involved in helping to rebuild these buildings. that they were in conversation with forgiving church members who love jesus and want to see justice done at the same time. lovingly.