Friends,
If not now, when?
 The Senate debate on legislation to stop gun violence is about to begin!
Call your senators today, April 9, and insist that they act to prevent gun violence! Ensure that the voices of faith and conscience ring throughout the halls of Congress as part of a national day of Faiths Calling. Demand that we enact universal background checks, bans on semi-automatic assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, gun trafficking laws, and improved access to mental health services.
- Call your senators today at (888) 897-0174 and insist that they act to prevent gun violence. Ensure that the voices of faithful Americans ring throughout the halls of Congress. You can use the Faiths Calling web form to be automatically connected!
- When you call your senators for today's national interfaith call-in day, remind them that universal background checks work -- and that you are a member of the faith community demanding action now.
- Tell senators that a University of Notre Dame study found that the end of the assault weapons ban in 2004 led to more than 2,600 additional murders in Mexico in the following four years, because of assault weapons sold freely here. The gun industry should not profit from drug traffickers' violence.
In taking action, you will be part of the many actions that FOR members and others have taken since December 14, 2012, when a gunman in Sandy Hook Elementary School shot and killed twenty children and six adult staff members, who died trying to protect their kids.
Actions by FOR members and people of faith
FOR members supported a petition in Arkansas organized by Prof. Sidney Burris that successfully opposed legislation to allow students and faculty to carry concealed weapons on the state's campuses. "In no small part," says Prof. Burris, "this is because of the efforts of the Fellowship of Reconciliation in helping spread the word amongst our citizens."
Oregon FOR has joined Ceasefire Oregon to promote gun buybacks, gun reform legislation, and dialogue about the presence of guns in and near schools. On Thursday, clergy from Newtown, Connecticut and around the nation will stand in a field of more than 3,000 grave markers on the National Mall in Washington, to remember the 3,300 people who have been killed by gun violence in the United States since the tragedy in Newtown in December.
Looking forward to a more peaceful future
The slaughter of 20 small children in their school classrooms shook us all to the core. And in the days following that heart-breaking morning, our political leaders swore that at last there would be comprehensive new gun legislation. Now, four months later, the time has come to see if we as a nation are ready to make these changes.
Today, Tuesday April 9, is a national interfaith call-in day to demand comprehensive gun legislation.
Please join us today and take a minute to call (888) 897-0174 or use the easy online web form, and let our senators know that you support new legislation for sane gun laws.
Yours in peace,
John Lindsay-Poland
for the Fellowship of Reconciliation |
