I remember planting a garden with my dad. Every year, no matter how careful we were, weeds would grow up in our garden among the plants. Whenever we weeded the garden, dad would say make sure you get the roots, otherwise it will grow back. There is a weed growing in our culture today, and if we are to get rid of it, we must get to the root of the problem. There is so much vitriol and hatred in our culture as witnessed by rejoicing over the assassination of Charlie Kirk. I do not expect everyone to mourn his passing, but I never thought there would be so much glee. From where did this come from.

We could point to the proliferation of violence in media. Movies, television, online, gaming, and even music are filled with violence. When the young Ukrainian woman was killed on the train in Charlotte, there was a time that the video of it would not have shown on the news because it was too violent, but now it shown at all times of the day. We could point to the glorification of death. Death is now simply a choice whether it is for the preborn or the infirmed. We are at the point now that I am hearing people argue for abortion for sex determination. When life is not valued, death is not abhorred.  When you add these to the dehumanization of people through social media. People have been reduced to a sound bite, a post, or a video clip. All of these do not provide context for what is being said nor do they paint a full picture of who a person is. It is easy to hate a straw man, it becomes harder when we see them as a person.

We may not be able to remove these roots from society, but we can remove them from our own souls. We can work hard not to be desensitized to the violence that is so prolific in our media. We can choose to value all life and we can choose to love our neighbors as ourselves, by not demonizing those who disagree with us.