Minnesota Martyrs- Guest Post Nate Van Denend

I haven't been able to put words to the most recent civilian massacre in any meaningful way this week, and I'm thankful to have read Nate's words which are both convicting and encouraging. We are sharing this post here hoping that you are stirred towards both a zeal for justice and loving compassion after reading these thoughts. 

Nate Van Denend has served as an ordained minister of the Word in the Christian Reformed Church since 2010. He has served at Maranatha CRC Woodbridge (from 2010-2017) and currently serves at  Christian Reformed Church-Chatham-Kent (from 2017-present). *Originally Posted on CRC Voices

Minnesota Martyr

When we hear the word Martyr, we tend to associate it with the Islamist type.  

That's too bad, because our Christian understanding of martyrdom has a considerably different meaning and sense.

One of the more recent martyr stories is the story of the 21 martyrs who were kidnapped and then beheaded by ISIS.

As the story goes, they were all Orthodox Christians except one. Each Christian was asked to renounce Christ and each one refused and lost his head. When the last one, who likely was not a Christian, was confronted with the same question he said, "I believe what they believe." He lost his head, too. Such is the power of the martyr, the witness.   This is a story we can tell because we have some distance from it. This kind of martyrdom happens in a cultural setting completely different than ours.  We don't live in a world with jihadis beheading people with swords and making videos of it. That doesn't happen in the west. And thus, we can conclude that martyrdom itself doesn't really happen in the west. 

When the martyrdom story hits closer to home, like say in Minnesota, I find it is difficult to frame it as a martyrdom story. Martyrdom is something that happens elsewhere to other Christians who live in different times and different places. It is difficult then to think about the two children who were brutally murdered while praying in church as martyrs. And yet, that is the correct term. They died practicing their faith and they were specifically targeted because they were Christians, practicing their faith. As the story trickles out, this aspect of the story becomes clear. Whatever else was going on, this was about killing Christian kids because they were Christian kids. They join the many who have been gunned down in churches by Islamist terrorists in Iraq, Syria and other places for the same reason - being a Christian practicing their faith.

A politician said that thoughts and prayers won't bring them back. This is true, but also a strange thing to say. When we realize that they are martyrs, then we can understand that they have received a martyr's crown. It is likely that they wouldn't want to be sent back, now that they see in full what we only can see dimly as through a mirror. Instead, they remain with us as witnesses, which is what the term martyr means. In death they bear witness to the sacrifice of Jesus, who also died at the hands of his enemies (even at the hands of his own people, a pattern that played out in Minnesota as well).  

Seeing them as martyrs opens up different possibilities for a Christian response. Everyone from the first martyr, Stephen, to the many who would follow, prayed for the forgiveness of their killers.

The martyrs bear witness to Christ AND they also bear witness to humanity of their killers. With the prayer for forgiveness they say to their enemies "you are not monsters, but sinners in need of forgiveness." This is where the Christian martyr is different than the Islamist one... the Christian martyr desires the salvation of his enemies, the Islamist desires their destruction. The Christian at prayer is the Christian who prays "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." 

If the martyr bears witness to the humanity of his or her enemies, then this reframes how we view the clearly disturbed individual who opened fire on the church. He legally became a she at age 17 and then wrote about regretting being trans. In light of this, I'll stick with "he." This is not a story that fits the usual narratives. Some angry people on X want to condemn all trans folks because of what happened. Some angry people disown him and say he wasn't really trans since he regretted being trans and committed a horrific act. He was a student at the school and perhaps even a worshipper at one point at the church he attacked. Part of his story is being a lapsed Catholic, no one seems to be talking about that. One can only really hate those they know. The same is true of love.  

This person became an enemy of praying Christian children. The martyrs bear witness to that. We can watch the media try to dodge the question of who this person was. Immediately the attention is turned toward guns, although it seems like this person would have used the weapons available. The media also try to carefully make connections to the person's trans identity, as though one who kills is in some sense more of a victim then those who are killed. It is an interesting dance. Can a victim be guilty too? Even there, the person disappears into the group we call "trans" and the specifics get lost. However, the specifics matter. One cannot love abstract categories of people. One can only love people. One cannot love 'enemies' in the abstract. It is those who are throwing the stones that Stephen can offer forgiveness to. The fact that he took his own life makes this all the more tragic. Like Judas, he didn't wait around to see that he had got some things catastrophically wrong.  

It is easy to blame the ideas and worldviews that may have shaped the motives of the shooter. It may be simpler than that. Those who cultivate anger and hatred produce a harvest of violence and murder. It doesn't matter if you are a neo-nazi or a radical trans activist or just an angry teen. Our constant social media environment pours gas on the angry fires, I expect we will see more explosions. We may also see more martyrs who can bear witness to Christ and him crucified. 

In the midst of what must be overwhelming grief, I hope there is some small consolation for the families in knowing that their children died while praying.    

Nate