I found myself thinking this week a lot about my friend Greg Cantori’s post last week about who are our heroes and why? Greg called out for all of us the importance of honoring heroes who are working to bring about lasting, radical change to broken systems. As we celebrate our national birthday and “freedom day” in the United States, I am grateful for the freedoms we have and deeply saddened and frustrated by the persistence of so many ways we block freedom for all.

Gun violence and the epidemic of mass shootings in the United States have been on my mind as I thought about heroes and leaders. A priest friend of mine, Joe Muth, leads our liturgy at our small intentional Catholic Community every couple of months. Recently he has begun his sermons with a report on mass shootings in the United States. This past Sunday he painfully shared that there have been 300 mass shootings (a shooting in which four or more people were injured or killed) in the United States since the beginning of 2023.

Sadly, we now have a Gun Violence Archive which tracks mass shootings, suicides and other injuries and losses caused by guns in the US. I am deeply troubled by the alarming increase in mass shootings that have occurred over the past 5 years. There were over 600 mass shootings annually in 2021 and in 2022.

As depressing as these statistics are, we have become numb to their meaning and appear impotent to make real change. There are many hero leaders advocating for state and national legislation to make guns less available and mass shootings less common. But we seem stuck and overwhelmed by the complexity. Pro-gun advocates like to shift attention to our mental health crisis. Indeed, one reason for our mass shooting epidemic is our mental health epidemic. Both are difficult to talk about.  Building coalitions that work for real systemic change is also difficult

We have hero leaders working on systemic change to decrease gun violence and to increase access to mental health services. Brady United is a decades-long coalition working to change gun access in the US. Reflecting my inattention to this issue, I didn’t realize until I began researching for this post that June is National Gun Violence Awareness month.

Father Joe went beyond updating statistics this past Sunday. He told the story of how recently the people of Serbia were so upset with just two mass shootings this year that they organized a successful voluntary program to surrender firearms. A New York Times article paints a more complicated picture of guns and violence in Serbia. Father Joe’s source painted a more positive picture of the action in Serbia to stop gun violence. The NY Times focused more on opposition to reducing access to guns and the challenges of reform. The point is that ordinary citizens were appalled by two mass shootings and began to act. And this occurred in a country like the US where many people own guns.

None of this news points to a solution or a united path forward.  Where are the leaders from the labor unions, churches, student organizations and so many others who came together to fight for civil rights and an end to the Vietnam War? Romantically dreaming about the past doesn’t change anything today. Each of us is free to speak up as Father Joe does regularly about the insanity of our tolerance of an out-of-control gun culture. Whatever influence or power we have, how do we use it to broaden support for positive change?

There are numerous hero leaders working on gun violence, and polls repeatedly show broad support among American voters for action on the issue. What will it take for the leaders and the general public to coalesce into a mass movement for change? How hero leaders might unite and connect with average citizens for long-term change isn’t clear to me. There are lots of opportunities and no simple answers. Full community engagement raises the odds for lasting change on gun violence… and on other pressing social issues of our day. And perhaps over time, we can become the nation of freedom we aspire to be.