I think I've found the reason for the increase in school shootings, but not everyone will like what I've written

Staggering Numbers Of Millennials Are Leaving Church

and It's All Our Own Fault

by Web pastor Paul J. Bern

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For decades, the United States has been thought of as a Christian nation around the globe. But today that is dramatically changing – especially among America's young people. The truth is that all of the recent polls tell us that Americans under 30 years of age are rejecting the Christian faith in unprecedented numbers. In fact, what the numbers reveal is not a slow move away from the Christian faith. Rather, they clearly portray a massive wave of young Americans running away from traditional Christianity as fast as they can. Not only that, but the vast majority of young adults in America today do not go to church, do not pray and do not read the Bible. Just consider a few of the results from a fairly recent (2015) and deeply troubling survey of 18 to 29 year old Americans:

• 65% rarely or never pray with others, and 38% almost never pray by themselves either.
  
• 65% rarely or never attend worship services of any kind.
  
• 67% don't read the Bible or any other religious texts on a regular basis.
  

That is a solid two-thirds of American young adults who don't even have the slightest connection to traditional Christianity. If the current trends continue, the Millennial generation will see churches closing as quickly as Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Daewoo, Plymouth and Saturn dealerships from just a few years ago. The survey did find that 65% of those surveyed did call themselves "Christian", but among that 65%, the majority are what I call CINO's (Christians in name only). Most are just indifferent. The more precisely you try to measure their Christianity, the fewer you find committed to the faith.

But it just isn't this latest survey that is showing a mass exodus from the Christian faith by America's young people. According to a more recent (2016) survey by America's Research Group, 95 percent of 20 to 29 year old evangelical Christians attended church regularly during their elementary school and middle school years. However, only 55 percent of those young evangelical Christians still attended church regularly during high school, and only 11 percent of them were still regularly attending church when they went to college. That's it, just a paltry 11 percent! And that was among self-identified evangelical Christians.

But the most recent survey from this same nonprofit was perhaps even more troubling. According to that survey, 15% of Americans now say they have "no religion" – which is up from 8% in 1990. However, what was much more disturbing was that 46% of Americans between the ages of 18 to 34 indicated that they had no religion in the survey. Is it any wonder that atheism is on the rise? Forty-six percent is not just a trend. That is not just a landslide, either. I would define that as a stampede. Today there most certainly is a mass exodus of America's young people from the traditional Christian faith. There is simply no getting around it. Another recent poll by America's Research Group showed that less than 1 percent of all Americans between the ages of 18 and 23 hold a Biblical world view. And what is a Biblical world view? This has been defined as someone holding on to the following six key beliefs:

1) Believing that absolute moral truth exists.
2) Believing that the Bible is completely accurate in all of the principles it teaches.

3) Believing that Satan is considered to be a real being or force, not merely symbolic.

4) Believing that a person cannot earn their way into Heaven by trying to be good or by doing good works.

5) Believing that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life on earth.

6) Believing that God is the all-knowing, all-powerful creator of the world who still rules the universe today.

Using those six criteria, less than 1 percent of Americans between the ages of 18 and 23 hold a Biblical world view. That's no more than 3 million out of 330,000,000! The implications of this are staggering. The truth is that the United States is quickly becoming a highly secularized nation. Europe has already been down this road, and now America is rapidly following. Hundreds (perhaps thousands) of churches will close in the next 10 years as more and more people simply quit going. Large numbers of Christian ministries, radio stations, television shows and book stores will have to shut their doors because there will not be nearly enough people to support them. But the most frightening thing of all is that we are losing almost an entire generation to the world. Never before in U.S history has an entire generation rejected the Gospel as much as this one has. America's young people are rejecting the Christian faith, and yet the mainstream Christian establishment keeps running around and telling everyone that everything is fine. Fine??

No, everything is not fine. Not even close -- in point of fact, nowhere near! The Church in America is broken – completely! It is very rare to find a church where authentic Christianity is being practiced anymore. Our young people are not stupid. They know what is real and what is not. When they hear pastors tell them they must give 10% of what they earn each and every week, that's not what the Gospel says and they know it. When they hear TV evangelists trying to convince them that God wants us all to be rich, when our youth hear them condemning gay people when it's not their business to judge, when they see 'conservative Christians' protesting abortion in the streets as they send your sons and daughters off to fight wars that benefit only a handful of people, millennial's can see the hand-writing on the wall. If the Church in America – yes, I said the Church – would repent and turn back to real, authentic Christianity, at least we would have a chance of capturing the attention of those young Americans who are honestly looking for the truth. But instead, people of all ages – not just the young – are hungry and thirsty for some real truth. They're fed up to here with all the spiritual bull-crap being dished out by for-profit churches and all the con artists on TV who have the nerve to call themselves “apostle” or “bishop”, and they're looking for some authenticity. You know, like the kind Jesus had?

What did Jesus say about all this? “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled (Matthew chapter five, verse 6).” Translated into 21^st century English, this simply means come to Jesus Christ in and of himself, and simply leave the churches behind. You will no doubt recall that Jesus put his money where his mouth was in this regard when he threw the money changers out of the temple. He wasn't nice about it either. He didn't have to be. In the here and now of the modern church – or Church Incorporated as I like to call it – anybody can see that the descendants of the money changers have once again set up shop in houses of worship. As a result, you had best be really sure that He is returning very soon for yet another house cleaning. Christ will be far more angry the second time around as he was the first. So much more....

On the surface, it would be easy to say that every bit of the fault for this lies with modern church leadership. But that is not entirely the fault of the Church, although the leadership does bear a good bit of the responsibility. The truth is that we – the parents of the millenials I'm writing about – have created a society where our children are taught that Jesus and Christianity are not important any more. Our public schools teach our children day after day after day that they evolved from monkeys, that abortion, indiscriminate sex before marriage and homosexuality are perfectly normal for everyone, and that anyone who disagrees is either a bigot or an idiot. Then these same accusers go home and surround themselves with endless entertainment for the rest of the day (television, video games, Internet, movies, and often pornography), effectively isolating themselves from their families and each other. The overwhelming message regarding the Christian faith in the above forms of entertainment is that either Christianity is irrelevant, not true or should be openly mocked. Only thing is, they have forgotten that you can't mock God or Jesus. You cannot mock God any more than a Chevy can mock General Motors.

So should we be surprised that the overwhelming majority of our children and grandchildren have rejected the Christian faith? Should we expect anything else? What else were we expecting, John the Baptist? We have raised our children in the godless society that we have constructed and now we are so surprised that they are godless. People everywhere are pulling their hair out trying to figure out why all these school shootings have sprung up seemingly out of nowhere over the last 15 years or so. But nobody should be surprised. We are just reaping what we have sown, and we now have an unexpected bumper crop of wanton violence. I'd say we have our work cut out for us for the foreseeable future, so we'd better get started. Because if we don't start repairing the damage we have caused by letting electronic devices do our parenting for us, we are going to lose an entire generation. And that, ladies and gentlemen, would be totally unacceptable.

Twenty Five Uncomfortable Truths

You Shall Not Bear False Witness: 25 Uncomfortable Facts

The Mainstream Media Wouldn't Discuss in 2015

by Rev. Paul J. Bern

The Ninth Commandment, as it written in the Book of Exodus chapter 20 along with other nine, is very explicit – you shall not lie (or “thou shalt not”, if you prefer). Yet for its entire existence, humankind has developed a remarkable propensity for ever more sophisticated forms of deception. For example, during the Hitler dictatorship in Germany from the 1930's up to the mid-40's, there was a branch of the government called "The Ministry of Propaganda" that dished out a torrent of profane distortions about Jewish people, and later the outcome of the war itself. It was headed by a guy named Joseph Goebbels, who committed suicide at the end of the war rather than face capture, which would surely have been followed by a death sentence at the Nuremberg Trials. Today in America, we have a similar position within the White House staff that we call the Press Secretary, who can be seen regularly on the evening news. He serves the same function, he just has a far more innocuous title than "Propaganda Minister". This person's job – and I have noticed regular personnel changes – is to spoon-feed the media the information du joir of the day. Everybody knows that the media is told what to say and how to say it, and yet there were remarkably few protests about it up until about 2011 or so. This was during the mushrooming of the Arab Spring, which led to the “Occupy Wall St.” and “we are the 99%” Movements, and more recently into the “Black Lives Matter” protests, all of which are still very much active today. So this week's message is my small contribution towards demanding some genuine truth and authenticity from our news sources. No more US Government propaganda please, we're all fed up with the government! Not so much America, mind you, just the government.

For decades, the mainstream media in the United States was accustomed to being able to tell the American people what to think and how to think it. Unfortunately for them, a whole lot of Americans are starting to break free from that paradigm and think for themselves. Contrary to what many atheists and agnostics are saying, this includes a significant number of people of faith like myself. A Gallup survey from 2012 found that 60 percent of all Americans “have little or no trust” in the mainstream media. That number is now exceeding 80 percent here at the dawn of 2016. More people than ever are realizing that the mainstream media is giving them a very distorted version of current events and human history, and they are increasingly seeking out alternative sources of information. In the United States today, just six giant media corporations control the mainstream media. Those giant media corporations own television networks, cable channels, movie studios, radio stations, newspapers, magazines, publishing houses, music labels and even many prominent websites. But now, thanks to the Internet the mainstream media no longer has a complete monopoly on the news. In recent years the “alternative media” (Alternet, Infowars, Democracy Now, Bill Moyers, Truthdig, etc.) has exploded in popularity. People want to hear about the things that the mainstream media doesn’t really want to talk about. They want to hear news that is not filtered by corporate bosses and government censors. They want “the whole damn truth”, and they know that they are not getting it from the mainstream media. That's also one of the primary reasons why people are doing away with cable TV as I have. It's not just the money saved from unsubscribing to cable TV, it's the fact that everybody knows everything they are watching is a load of BS!!

We are watching a media revolution happen, and many influential people in the traditional media are totally freaking out about it. In fact, some in the traditional or “lame stream” media have even begun publishing articles that mock the American people for not trusting the MSM. For example, a 2012 CNN article entitled, “Still ‘Paranoid’ After All These Years” portrayed Americans that don’t trust the media as paranoid conspiracy theorists that have left rationality behind. Ever have the feeling you’re being lied to by the news media, the authorities, the corporate world? That somebody — or something — is out to get you? You’re not alone, and you're not losing your mind, either. Welcome to 21st-century America. Look around. Trust is hitting historic lows. Less than one fifth of Americans have a favorable view of the federal government, a decline of about 40% since 2002, according to the Pew Center for People and the Press. Gallup has Congress’ approval rating down in the low teens. And the news media aren’t much better off. “Negative opinions about the performance of news organizations now equal or surpass all-time highs on nine of 12 core measures the Pew Research Center has been tracking since 1985,” a Pew report said back in the summer of 2013. The article goes on to make it sound like it is very irrational not to trust the media, but in this day and age it is imperative that we all learn to think for ourselves. Pardon me if this seems a bit too blunt, but blindly trusting someone else to do your thinking for you is both very dangerous and very lazy. Contrary to what all the conformists have been saying, it's perfectly OK to be skeptical!

Anyone that does not acknowledge that the mainstream media has an agenda is either really naive or they're not being honest with themselves. The mainstream media presents a view of the world that is very favorable to their big corporate owners and the big corporations that spend billions of dollars to advertise on their networks. The mainstream media is the mouthpiece of the Establishment, and the worldview being pushed on the big networks is going to be consistent with the economic, financial, political and social goals of the Establishment. The mainstream media loves to talk about things that fit with that agenda, and they don’t like to talk about things that suggest that there is something wrong with that agenda. The following are 25 facts that the mainstream media doesn’t really want to talk about, because they are all 'red flags' that tell us that theirs is an agenda for a system broken beyond repair:

#1 The mainstream media doesn’t really want to talk about the fact that gun sales are absolutely skyrocketing in the aftermath of all the mass shootings everywhere. Americans from all backgrounds are arming themselves to the teeth!

#2 They also don’t really want to talk about the fact that disarming the population has resulted in some of the most horrific massacres in human history.

• 1911 – Turkey disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1915 – 1917 they murdered 1.5 million Armenians.
• 1929 – Russia disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1929 – 1953 they murdered 20 million Russians.
• 1935 – China disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1948 – 1952 they murdered 20 million Chinese.
• 1938 – Germany disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1939 – 1945 they murdered 6 million Jews and slaughtered 34 million others.
• 1956 – Cambodia disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1975 – 1977 they murdered 1 million educated people.
• 1964 – Guatemala disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1964 – 1981 they murdered 100,000 Mayan Indians.
• 1970 – Uganda disarmed it’s citizens, and between 1971 – 1979 they murdered 300,000 Christians.

#3 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that a bill allowing for the “indefinite military detention of US citizens on American soil” was quietly passed by the U.S. Senate more than 3 years ago. Never mind that it's completely unconstitutional (see the Bill of Rights to the US Constitution, namely the 4^th, 5^th and 8th amendments).

#4 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that volcanoes all along the Pacific ocean's “ring of fire” are roaring to life. It seems like a new eruption is being reported every few days now, and earthquakes globally are at an all time high.

#5 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that the use of genetically engineered seeds has caused on explosion of new “super weeds” that are incredibly difficult for farmers to kill.

#6 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that trends forecasters globally are predicting a major financial disaster in 2016.

#7 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that it is easier to get into Harvard than it is to get a job as a flight attendant in America today.

#8 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that over 500 TSA employees have been fired for stealing from travelers since 2003. Our tax dollars hard at work. Nice.

#9 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that giant corporations such as Facebook, GE, Halliburton and Citibank (among numerous others) are funneling gigantic amounts of money through offshore banking havens such as the Cayman Islands in an effort to avoid taxes.

#10 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that the U.S. dollar is in danger of losing its status as the primary reserve currency of the world. If this were to occur – which is becoming increasingly likely – financial calamity would surely follow. Such a calamity would make the 2008 crash and the Great Depression seem like a daycare center in comparison.

#11 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that they should be doing a much better job keeping track of Wall Street speculators, their bankers, and all their filthy lucre. Instead, the MSM has to mention that president Barack Obama has gone off to vacation in Hawaii while the rest of the nation works multiple part time jobs.

#12 They don't want to discuss the fact that one fourth of all homeless people in America are children under the age of 12. This one social injustice alone makes me ashamed to be an American. Moreover, like the rest of the country, I too am one check away from becoming homeless myself. For such a thing as this to be happening in what is allegedly the world's richest country is absolutely inexcusable!

#13 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that the U.S. economy is losing millions of jobs to nations where it is legal to pay workers slave labor wages. Actually, this process is already started in the US as well, due to the fact that no one can live on a minimum wage paycheck of $7.25 an hour. The mainstream media is totally married to the one world economic agenda that their corporate owners make so much money from, and so they say nothing as a steady stream of businesses and American middle class jobs continue to leave the country.

#14 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that large numbers of formerly patriotic Americans are leaving the country in droves because they are completely disgusted with what America has become – the world's largest arms merchant and biggest bully.

#15 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that hunger and poverty are absolutely exploding in the United States at the same time that they are telling us that the US economy has 'recovered'.

#16 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that North Korea now has a three-stage rocket with enough range to potentially hit the western United States.

#17 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that the United States Postal Service is losing 25 million dollars a day and is on the verge of financial collapse.

#18 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that our biggest oil supplier in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, still kills people for changing religions.

#19 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that 'political correctness' is taking over America. The truth is that the media does not see any problem with that at all.

#20 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that nearly half a million employees of the federal government are making more than $100,000 a year.

#21 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that the birth rate in the United States has fallen to an all-time low. The elite are actually absolutely thrilled that less babies are being born.

#22 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that many major U.S. cities are seeing violent crime totally spiral out of control.

#23 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that Barack Obama received more than 99 percent of the vote in more than 100 precincts in Ohio on election day back in 2012.

#24 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that during the first four years of the Obama administration, the U.S. national debt grew by about as much as it did from the time that George Washington took office to the time that George W. Bush took office.

#25 They don’t really want to talk about the fact that the Federal Reserve created the conditions for the last financial crisis and their mismanagement of the economy has now brought us to the verge of another horrible economic downturn. According to the mainstream media, the Federal Reserve is “above politics” and should not be criticized. Maybe the Federal Reserve should be nationalized so that printing and coining money returns to the auspices of the US Treasury like our Constitution specifies (see article 1, section 8). All the US top-tier leadership needs to do is return to the original Constitution. It's the perfect way to wipe out the so-called national debt, which really only exists on paper anyway. But they can't because their corporate sponsors won't allow it. That's why the system is broken, and it's up to us, “we the people”, to get the job done.

Some deep thoughts about the shootings in Oregon this past week

What Kind of People Do We Want To Be?

By Rev. Paul J. Bern

I was having a casual conversation with someone just recently, and there came a point where I was asked, “What to you do?”. I replied that I was a minister and a writer, as well as a blogger and political activist. “What denomination are you from?”, she inquired. I explained that I was nondenominational, and that I was not aligned nor affiliated with any other churches, be they virtual churches like this website or brick-and-mortar. I talked to her about my views regarding being set aside, or standing alone, pledging allegiance only to Jesus Christ instead of 'Religion, Inc'. By that time, it was time for me to get off the train, and we bid each other warm goodbye's. But it got me to thinking: Who or what do I say that I am? What's my sense of identity? Does that match up to what's going on inside my head, or do I think one way and act another? These are not comfortable questions for anyone, but if we don't inquire about this to ourselves, how do we measure our authenticity as human beings? And so I took an internal, in-between-the-ears inventory of myself. I came to the conclusion that, among other things, I want to be like Chris Mintz, who took multiple bullets at Oregon's Umpqua Community College during this past week's school shooting du joir, saving many more lives in the process.

I want to be a peacemaker like Mr. Mintz's friends and family members have called him, and I too stand against indiscriminate violence wherever it may be found. “Blessed are the peacemakers”, Jesus said at the Sermon on the Mount, “for they shall be called 'sons of the living God'”. So I concluded that being a peacemaker was a good starting point regarding my own self-inventory. The apostle John wrote about this topic in his first Epistle nearly 2,000 years ago, and I quote: “If anyone says, 'I love God', yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother” (1^st John chapter 4, verses 20-21, NIV). People who are devoid of love can never be peacemakers because they are inherently selfish individuals. But if we are true Christians and followers of Christ, we sow seeds of peace and unconditional love wherever we go. If you want to be a man or woman of peace, the first step in learning how to do that is to worship the Prince of Peace. Let Jesus be your example to follow, your coach and your mentor.

I am also a crusader for civil and/or human rights, and against social injustice and economic inequality. I have written and self-published two books on these topics and I have blogged extensively as well. I was formerly middle class before winding up on disability. I know what it's like to lose everything and to have to start one's life all over again from scratch. And I know what it's like to wind up homeless. One of the most important lessons I learned from these experiences is that we live unfulfilled lives as long as we chase after money, material goods and the trappings of luxury and convenience. These are the things that simply don't matter in the long run. But seeing who is in need, or what contribution can be made, or what innovation can be implemented that benefits everyone equally, it is all these things that we should strive to achieve. Cooperation, then, replaces competition when it comes to the worship of the Son of God, and this bleeds over into the life of the believer like a Spiritual blood transfusion. Competition is so 19^th and 20^th century! Mutual cooperation for mutual benefit, like a beehive, is the wave of the future, and it resembles God's kingdom on earth much more closely (see Revelation chapter 20, verses 4-6).

That is only part of His directions for those that followed Him concerning how they were supposed to live life in service to others. Christians call it the Sermon on the Mount, but it was lived as a lifestyle until about 300 AD by Jesus' followers. By then some Old Testament teachings on warfare had replaced Christianity as a lifestyle and devalued it to a mere ideology. Jesus also said he came to replace the law because it had not been followed by the Jews, much to their own detriment. Just think of all the false teachers and error-laden churches that ignore these teachings. For those who do not follow His teachings I ask this: Are we all the same peoples despite color or nationality, and all the same citizens despite the unjust nature of government or of the religion we follow?

Is civilization all about wars and conflict? What about the non-warriors whose gifts to us include all the advances in farming that none should go hungry? Those who devised portable or temporary shelters so that man could venture beyond the close environs of the cave or those who devised ways to bring water to the villages that none might be thirsty or crops perish from the lack of water? Who was the hero or heroine who devised the wheel? Who among our ancestors built stationary shelters that we now call houses? Who first tamed and rode horses? All of these people from our ancient past are true heroes, giving us lasting gifts that advanced civilization, even if the gifts were soon turned to warlike purposes. Is someone considered a danger because of their gender, sexuality, skin color, political ideology or personal attributes? Why is it that women in modern society earn an average of 25% lower pay for the same work as opposed to men? Why is a nurse less valued than a doctor? Why is a teacher less valued then a banker or a lawyer? How many can name one person who is not recognized by their own community for what they have given? 

 

How will we be remembered by the next generation? We are all given a choice and a say in what happens tomorrow, today. A million today’s were shaped by what a million nameless, faceless someones did yesterday. Do we go along to get along or do we stand up and demand our say-so and contribution in our future? Do you wait for Jim or Sally, Joe or Jane to take the lead, or do you begin hoping that they will say or do something you can agree with? The only person responsible for your decisions and what happens tomorrow because of them, is the one looking back at you in the mirror. Shall we become part of the solution, or remain part of the problem? We can be contributing individuals to the world of tomorrow, or the zoned-out TV watchers and self-isolating video game players of today. Which do we choose?

Which brings us back to the community and the growing of support and friendship. Who are your friends? Are they just people you grew up with or work with or go to the club or church with? Are they all men or women or all the same racial background as you are? Are all of your friends the same general age or do you number the elderly and the children among your friends? In our society friendship sometimes seems shallow, temporary and based on filling someone's immediate needs. One different outcome and way of looking at friendship is offered in the Native American community. They look at friendship as a choice, a responsibility and that it be long lasting. Jesus said it best when he uttered these words, “Greater love has no man, than to lay down his life for his friends”. 

 

A friend is someone you choose to give your friendship to without any qualification. It doesn't matter what they do in life, it doesn't matter what they may or may not have done. The friendship remains not because of who we are or what we have to offer. Friendship is a mutual choice. So, go out and make one new friend this week and go back to your current friends and say you will support them, stand by them and offer advice if they ask for it. Make sure they know that you will help them in time of trouble. When times of trouble do arrive, such as mass shootings, follow through with them. Enjoy their companionship at all times. Make it your choice, it is your life. Are you starting to see being a peacemaker as something worthwhile now? Is peacemaking something of value in your family, neighborhood, community, state or nation? Are you willing to become a peacemaker or support those who do choose to become one? Will you be a Chris Mintz, or one who will actively support such uncommon and tough-as-nails individuals? Will you be part of the solution to gun violence?

I, for one, vow to do so without hesitation, and I will go to any length to propagate peace, even if my personal safety is at risk. I will continue to insist that all life is precious, that all life is God's handiwork, with each form of life having a singular uniqueness all its own. I will continue to advocate for the homeless because every human being on the planet has the fundamental human right to shelter. The cave men of 10,000 or 20,000 years ago had roofs over their heads, and none of them ever punched a time clock. I will also continue to stand up against economic inequality, social and racial injustice, and waging warfare. I would endure torture, jail or death rather then compromise any of my beliefs. Perhaps my enduring any or all of the above will bring others to believe as I do, knowing that I write on Christ's behalf. I will speak out against any injustice or any war, and even use my own body to shield victims of injustice, if necessary, just like that ex-soldier in Oregon did this past week. I am asking you to do the same, having given you all ample reason to support my stand. No more working for the wealthy to make them richer. We work for the benefit of all mankind from this day forward, not just the top 1 or 2 percent. And we will enforce peace across America, first by our relationship with Jesus Christ the Prince of Peace, and secondly by acquiring the means to defend ourselves whenever appropriate, so this terrible cycle of violence can be stopped for good.