Gun Violence is Making Us Less Catholic

In the wake of the two shootings claiming the lives of a prominent Christian speaker and two children at a Catholic school, a troubling pattern has emerged in Catholic commentary. Instead of these tragedies opening our hearts to compassion for all victims of gun violence, many Catholics rushed to call the victims "martyrs" and framed the attacks as proof of Christian persecution. These commentators then, almost proudly, seem to say: "The world hates us, so we must be doing something right."

That instinct may feel comforting, but it is not the way of Jesus.

Martyrdom Misused

In recent years, conservative U.S. Catholic culture has leaned heavily on the language of persecution and martyrdom. In moments of violence, the word martyr gets thrown around loosely.

Let's be clear: these shootings were horrific and inexcusable. My heart and prayers are with the victims and their families, and we must also take action to address what Pope Leo has called the "pandemic of arms."

But the word martyr is not a label to apply casually. In the Church's tradition, it is a solemn pronouncement given only when specific criteria are met. This recent indiscriminate use to describe any Christian who dies tragically seems to treat martyrdom—or persecution generally—like a badge of honor, as if persecution itself were proof of holiness. That was never how the Church understood it.

What "Martyr" Really Meant

Before Christianity, the Greek word martys meant witness; the kind of testimony someone might give in court. By the second century, Christians used it for those killed because of their testimony to Christ. The Church rightly revered these individuals as models of ultimate fidelity, but persecution was never a litmus test for faithfulness.

When Christianity became widely accepted, some believers still longed for ways to show radical devotion. So, a sect of early Christianity, now known as the Desert Mothers and Fathers, renounced comfort and bore heroic witness to God by dedicating their lives to prayer and fasting. But we as a Church must be careful because this heroic drive can arise from a disordered impulse: an unhealthy belief that unless one suffers dramatically, one hasn't truly proved their love for God. It's reminiscent of that ancient fear from Genesis that ordinary faithfulness isn't enough.

The Modern Parallel

I see echoes of that same impulse in today's Church. Many U.S. Catholics live in extraordinary comfort, yet we claim persecution as if we faced the same daily risks endured by believers in parts of the world where faith can cost one's life.

Take the recent debates in Oregon over mandatory reporting laws. Some Catholic outlets framed these proposed protections as "anti-Catholic" or "attacks on religious liberty." In reality, these laws were designed to protect children and ensure predators are reported. Were the proposals a governmental overreach? Reasonable people could debate that. But for a Church still reckoning with its own failures to protect the innocent, why was the first instinct to cry "persecution"?

This is not an isolated case. Too often, our church members confuse opposition to the conservative Catholic political agenda with persecution. But disagreement is not persecution.

And the horrendous killings of Fletcher Merkel, Harper Moyski, and Charlie Kirk—while tragic—do not make them martyrs of the faith. They are victims of our inability to end the plague of gun violence. Victims of our failure to build the kingdom of the Prince of Peace, where swords and guns are beaten into plowshares.

What Jesus Actually Said

Yes, Jesus told his disciples, "If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first." But he never presented hatred as proof of fidelity. Instead, he points to radical love of neighbor as the true mark of discipleship: "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another" (John 13:35). The "hatred" Jesus mentions isn't because Christians would live in antagonistic opposition to the world, but that our radical love of neighbor would challenge and transform society.

These are the final, authoritative words of Jesus before his death. This is his singular command. If some Catholics want to dismiss this phrase, love one another, as trite or claim that it is too easy, then it speaks more to a limited grasp of what love demands than a full understanding of the cost of discipleship.

A Better Way

This obsession with persecution reveals something deeper and far more tragic about how we see God. If we think we must earn God's love, faith becomes a contest, and we then must seek out dramatic ways to prove ourselves, whether through suffering or claiming victimhood. Faith becomes self-referential.

But if we trust that God's love is already ours, faith becomes about loving others. Tragedy then becomes an opportunity to show compassion—especially to those outside our faith.

These tragic shootings must be a wake-up call. This must be a time for us as a Church to mourn, pray, and act. Our suffering should expand our hearts so we can enter into the sufferings of others, not shrink into defensiveness or imagined persecution.

Because in the end, faithfulness is not measured by how much we are hurt, but by how much we love.

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Photo by Emiliano Bar on Unsplash