W5 Guns

Read the article, Too small to hire guards, too worried to go gun-free, community churches are now arming themselves, by Reis Thebault, in the Washington Post, dated 2/14/2020.  The article may be found here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/too-small-to-hire-guards-too-worried-to-go-gun-free-churches-are-now-arming-themselves/2020/02/14/8eabb574-3ee9-11ea-baca-eb7ace0a3455_story.html (Links to an external site.)

Write an ethical argument in favor of OR against the idea of religious houses of worship arming their members in order to protect themselves from the possibility of gun violence. Base your argument not on your opinion but on one of the three ethical theories discussed in the Weston text.

W5 Guns Answer

do not favor every parishioner to carry guns when going to the church to worship. Yes, there is a reason to worry and keep oneself protected. “FBI statistics show a 35 percent increase in hate crimes at churches, synagogues, temples and mosques from 2014 to 2018, the most recent year for which data is available” (Thebault, paragraph, 6). This fact is something that cannot be ignored.

W5 Guns Answer

Allowing houses of worship to have their members armed in order to prevent gun violence would be permissible under utilitarianism. Utilitarianism states that an act that produces the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people is moral. A variant of this is cost-benefit analysis, which posits that an act is desirable if the benefits outweigh the costs. In the case of religious houses arming their members, the benefits outweigh the costs. The costs of this proposed solution is that a church-member who does not have a military background or trained in using gun might shoot an innocent person during a commotion.