America’s tragic epidemic of violence claimed fresh victims on Sunday, when a middle-aged man drove a pickup truck into a Mormon worship service, shot at the 100-plus attendees, and burned the building to the ground with accelerant in the process. The incident, which claimed at least 12 victims (four dead and eight wounded) rocked Grand Blanc Township, a town of 40,000 just south of Flint, Michigan.
Yet this brief description fails to convey the full impact of the crimes. Michigan State Police Specialist Lt. Kim Vetter said Sunday night that investigators were still “working tirelessly to recover the victims of this incident and reunite families” (two deceased victims were found dead on Monday, having died not from gunshot wounds but the fire). In addition, authorities received multiple reported bomb threats at other sites, including churches.
By all accounts, law enforcement responded admirably throughout the ordeal. Two trained officers encountered the shooter and shot him dead in the parking lot only eight minutes after the attack began (if only the gathering had had armed security).
Yet the devastation was still extensive. A nearby hospital treated eight injured victims, including five with gunshot wounds and three with smoke inhalation. Authorities called the building a “total loss” and indicated that they may yet find more bodies inside.
Authorities identified the deceased suspect as a 40-year-old veteran who served in the Marine Corps from 2004 to 2008. They have yet to identify a motive for the attack, beyond the obvious fact that the attacker hated Mormons.
Regardless, the incident shows a concerning continuation of violence against places of worship, and the Trump administration is treating it as such. “This appears to be yet another targeted attack on Christians in the United States of America,” wrote President Donald Trump on Truth Social. “THIS EPIDEMIC OF VIOLENCE IN OUR COUNTRY MUST END, IMMEDIATELY!”
It is true that Christian schools and church buildings have faced unprecedented hostility in recent years. Family Research Council has catalogued 1,384 acts of hostility against churches from 2018 to 2024.
While orthodox Christians wouldn’t classify The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in the same way President Trump’s post does, it is also largely irrelevant to Trump’s policy response for Trump to recognize the distinction. The truth of the matter is that no one should be killed — either by civil authorities or vigilante justice — for peacefully practicing their religion, no matter how false that religion may be.
Based ultimately in biblical ideas, the U.S. Constitution both protects religious freedom and prevents the establishment of any one, state-endorsed religion. As Paul describes, the governing authority bears the sword against evildoers (Romans 13:4), but it lacks the competence (omniscient knowledge of right, wrong, and every human heart) necessary to judge beliefs. Whatever a person might think of a religion, Scripture instructs us to “leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord’” (Romans 12:19).
This religious tolerance is based in Jesus’s own parable of the wheat and the weeds (Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43), in which the Son of Man tells his servants not to pluck up the weeds before the harvest, “lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them” (Matthew 13:29). In other words, one reason for present forbearance of false worship is that it is impossible for fallible human governments to perfectly distinguish true and false worship.
Thus, from the very beginning, Bible-believing Christians have urged religious toleration, that no one should be punished or killed for their religion, whether they follow Jesus Christ, Joseph Smith, the Jewish rabbis, Mohammed, Buddha, or any other teacher. All will be made right in the end; for now, we live together peaceably and seek to persuade others to our way of thinking as we have opportunity. The government does have a role in protecting our freedom to do just that.
One bright spot amid the tragedy was the response from nurses at the local Henry Ford Hospital, who heard the news while striking over a labor dispute. However, as soon as they heard the news, many nurses left the picket line and rushed to the aid of the Mormon victims. “Human lives matter more than our labor dispute,” said local Teamsters President Dan Glass. That response and reasoning is deeply consistent with a biblical worldview.
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