Knoxville, Tenn. police has released a statement that a letter in the car of church shooter Jim D. Adkisson reveals that he targeted the congregation due to its liberal views on civil liberties and women’s and gay rights. Adkisson killed two people at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in the middle of a children’s performance.
Chief Sterling Owen IV said Adkisson had a “stated hatred of the liberal movement.” He is now charged with first-degree murder. Among the complaints against the church was its founding of a chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.
The children were performing “Annie” when Adkisson decided to kill people in the name of the true faith. According to reports, Greg McKendry, a 60-year-old usher and board member at the church, blocked the killer and was his first victim, click here.
It is simply astonishing that even a demented killer would think that God would want him to mow down Christians who are not sufficiently conservative, including children. Some reports indicate that he had problems with Christians in general, click here. It takes a lot of hate to walk into a scene of children performing in a religious sanctuary and turn it into a place of massacre. Of course, as with the Virginia Tech massacre, the story also reveals the best of humanity in those adults who confronted his man at the risk of their own lives. Had he not been restrained by church members, the death toll might have been much greater.
Ironically, the ACLU and these church members would likely be the first to defend Adkisson’s rights as he faces a potential death penalty for his alleged crimes.
For the latest on the story, click here.
This article has more info on what the letter said. It might shed some light.
.knoxnews.com/news/2008/jul/28/church-shooting-police-find-manifesto-su
Thats a common problem with the growth of the so called “Evangelical Christians”. They leverage scriptures like the Davidic narratives of Chronicles, or worse, the archaic laws of Moses from Leviticus, or Deuteronomy.
Not to pawn em of on the Jews, but in truth, given the fact they only bother read or preach from the Torah and a few of the epistles of the apostles, they would be better off calling themselves Evangelical Sanhedrin or something.
Mespo,
To be fair those laws were for the ancient Jewish people. They were just par for the course of the times.
Assuming the articles are accurate, the guy wasn’t a fan of Christianity or the Bible.
rafflaw
1, July 28, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Bee,
I can see the Ned Beatty resemblance, but to me he looks like the Unabomber.
lol, well, I was going for the Deliverance reference.
You can lay a good deal of the blame on radio nut cases like Limbaugh and Savage that whip up hatred of liberals so some nut job sitting by his radio goes on a rampage. Why don’t they just shut the f**k up and accept the fact that we are one nation, not a Christian nation, not a conservative nation, but a nation of individuals practicing radical freedom guaranteed to us in the Constitution. Rush and others have blood on their microphones; I wish it was theirs for a change.
Bee,
I can see the Ned Beatty resemblance, but to me he looks like the Unabomber. Just a little bit older.
JT:
“It is simply astonishing that even a demented killer would think that God would want him to mow down Christians who are not sufficiently conservative.”
***************************
Well maybe not so crazy in a literalist sort of way:
“Anyone arrogant enough to reject the verdict of the judge or of the priest who represents the LORD your God must be put to death. Such evil must be purged from Israel.” (Deuteronomy 17:12 NLT)
and the ever popular:
“They entered into a covenant to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, with all their heart and soul; and everyone who would not seek the Lord, the God of Israel, was to be put to death, whether small or great, whether man or woman.” (2 Chronicles 15:12-13 NAB)
Crazy though he may be, he just might be on the right side of the theological argument. Funny world wrought by religion.
john
1, July 28, 2008 at 4:12 pm
Why does he have a bond?
They gave THIS guy a bond?
😐
You sure they weren’t talking about restraints?
😐
I imagine he stopped going to the barber because they kept using the clippers on his face.
😐
This guy looks like Ned Beatty posing for a Cialis commercial.
rafflaw
1, July 28, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Why do these crazies always look so crazy?
Now we know where Billy Bob Thornton got the idea for “Bad Santa”.
Why does he have a bond? This man is a danger to society. He should not be released for any amount of money.
Judging by the previous comments he had made, the guy had a very obvious hatred of Christians and religion in general. You don’t have to be a Christian to disagree with Liberal views. The comments in this section paint him as some kind of right wing religious nut when that is the exact opposite of what he is. He hated Christians and he hated liberals. They are not always mutally exclusive.
Susan,
I agree that if convicted, this nutjob can spend all the rest of his fun loving days behind bars. Chris,you are right about the Anthrax attacks. There is a very good reason why those attacks haven’t been solved and he is sitting in the White House. I for one believe that the White House was behind the anthrax sent to the Democrats and media folk because they wanted to send a message.
Gyges
1, July 28, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Not liking Christians doesn’t make you an atheist.
…There’s a huge bias in this country where we assume if you’re religious you’re a Christian and if not, an Atheist
Very true, and its perpetuated by the pseudo christian groups calling themselves “evangelicals”.
The evangelical community has done more harm to Christianity, themselves, and this country, than any religious group since Jim Jones.
Without opinion, I’ll mention that I’ve read comments from people worried that we’re going to see a huge uptick in violence against abortion clinics, gay businesses, etc., under Obama. We saw this under Clinton, but it went down again under Bush.
It’s not because of any “law and order” nonsense, especially since this administration hasn’t made such prosecution a high priority. (How long was that guy who mailed anthrax spores to various democrats and Keith Olbermann’s home sentenced to prison? Oh yeah, nobody was ever prosecuted despite it being such a restricted substance that the number of people who had access would probably fit in an admittedly large room.)
Nope, the people with violent tendency simply felt that “conservative” administrations were going in the right direction, however slowly, so it wasn’t worth the risk to take more direct action. “Liberal” administrations, on the other hand, go in the wrong direction by protecting these groups and they felt like they didn’t have any choices other than naked violence — bombs in clinics, attempted murder of doctors, etc.
As I said I don’t know how much weight to give this argument, much less how much it applies in this situation, but it’s definitely food for thought.
Voice of Reason
1, July 28, 2008 at 2:49 pm
Just makes me wonder… why is it that in America, only the right wingers respond with violence, threats, and intimidation? The biggest domestic terrorists of the last 30 years have all be radical right wingers.
Well you’ve got a difficult point to argue against there. After all, Timothy McViegh was a far right gun loving wingnut, fueled on by the far right wing nut pseudo christian group, “Elohim City”.
And the damage he did was on that terrible day, as shocking to us as 911 was. The whole in the side of the Oklahoma federal bldg was so unbelievable, that words cannot describe.
Fortunately, we had a level headed president who didn’t “freak out” and panic when it happened.
And thanks to that presidents calm, level head, we got the “terrorists”.
rafflaw
1, July 28, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Why do these crazies always look so crazy?
I know.
😐
He looks like Nick Nolte filming a Walter Brennan biography.
rafflaw,
I agree with you and Mr. Bee, but the stone cold mass murderers usually wear expensive clothes and the barber comes to their home at their whim!
Jill
Gerald,
My comment was intentionally intended to not cast aspersions on any individual’s set of beliefs, but rather to draw attention to the media’s role in shaping public perceptions of tragic events such as these. The facts will speak for themselves once they are fully known. But one thing I feel for certain is that the constant sensationalized coverage of violent rampages, murders, kidnappings, crashes, drug ODs, celebrity misbehavior, or whatever… only feeds into the cycle of attention-starved desperadoes perpetrating acts like these.
Religion vs. atheism is kind of irrelevant at times like this (you can always find someone from one group or the other with blood on their hands). Our common humanity & compassion for our fellow beings in this world should trump any blanket judgements we might be tempted to make in righteous support of our own particular worldview.