The Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV), representing over 1000 traditional rabbis in matters of public policy, today called for cultivation of a “renewed culture of life” after multiple horrific mass shooting took dozens of American lives over the past weekend. At least 31 people lost their lives in shootings in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio.
“We should all agree that the mentally ill should not have access to guns,” said Rabbi Steven Pruzansky, Eastern Regional Vice President of the CJV, “but we should also focus upon the loss of values which has plagued America for generations. Several generations of values-free education has produced too many values-free children, in which life itself has little value or meaning.”
The CJV rejected efforts to politicize these tragedies, noting that the two shooters claimed to be at opposite ends of the political spectrum — and that, in any case, far more individuals die each year in individual or smaller acts of violence.
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“Americans have had similar access to guns for many years,” said Rabbi Yoel Schonfeld, Vice President of the CJV. “Calls for gun control go back to the assassination of Robert Kennedy in 1968, but do not reach the root of the problem. People who cherish the value of human life are slow to take one.”