Christians, Guns

Re “Presbyterians: Gunning for Control,” Voices, July 4:

I’ve heard of, and met, Bible-believing Christians and evangelical Christians and Christians on the far political right. But now you present us with a gun-owning Christian! The prospect of a Sunday School teacher instructing her little charges on the finer points of holding off the neighbors when the end times come was pretty scary.

What really got me thinking, though, was the way nearly all your respondents went to some length to separate the influence of their church from their daily lives. They spoke of the church’s function as being confined to prayer and so-called moral issues (abortion, birth control) but not more mundane concerns, such as the ethics of owning and using guns (or owning and profiting from tobacco stocks).

But I have always thought that that’s what religion is all about--not only one’s personal relationship with God, but also an institutional and community-based approach advising us how best to serve him in our lives. Something’s missing here.

BOB CHEPOLIS

Rancho Palos Verdes