Making it Through Mother’s Day Can be Difficult for Crime Victims

Our news reports are filled with stories of mass shootings, kidnap and the vilest rape imaginable. I can’t help wondering, with great pain in my heart, how the surviving victims of these awful crimes can face Mother’s Day. How can the survivors?

Although recent statistics show, amazingly, that violent crime and homicides are actually decreasing and are at a five-year low, those stats are cold comfort to those who have suffered at the hands of a violent criminal.

As the justice system swings into gear and punishes the criminal, we think, well that ought to bring the survivors some relief. Often it does not. In today’s world, if the crime is ratings worthy, the media will replay the footage over and over. This can often make things emotionally more difficult for survivors.

On holidays and especially on Mother’s Day, victims may experience feelings of extreme loss. The more recent the crime, survivors may experience anger, rage, or even numbness, shock, and confusion. These feelings are not normally associated with Mother’s Day, but they are exceedingly normal to victims of violent crimes. If we know an individual who is a victim of a violent crime, we must allow them the freedom to authentically feel what they truly feel on this emotionally charged day. That is not to say we can’t try to bring some warmth and love into the day. We should do that. Sometimes what is helpful is simply helping victims maintain a normal day-to-day routine. Maintaining the mundane can offer some relief and calm fears. So, it might be more appropriate not to make such a big deal out of Mother’s Day, but rather to just be there as a loved one or friend on this particular holiday and simply to assist in maintaining a sense of normalcy.

The Christian response is always to pray. Indeed, do pray for the crime victim and even for the perpetrator. Pray that the crime victim will one day be able to forgive. Forgiveness brings great release. As Christians we want to let the precious ones who have been the victims of crime know of the great healing and peace of Christ, but pushing this on the person who has experienced a horrific crime will probably not be at all helpful and may be extremely hurtful. The best thing for Christians to do is let the crime  victim see Christ through our loving attitude and actions. And of course, pray, pray, pray.

Crime Fiction, Sin, and Easter

I’m a traditionalist, I call the day Easter, where as some call it Resurrection Day. I guess I’m showing my age and perhaps my grumpiness.

Without going on and on about it, I’ve researched the word Easter, and its origin is that it came from the Celtic word for “east” as Jesus was crucified, died, and resurrected in the east. Of course the ancient Celts would select a word from their own language to describe the day…just as the Greeks chose the word pasha from their language.

The notion that Easter came from a pagan goddess of spring has largely been debunked by serious scholars. In fact, scholars can’t find any definitive proof there was a Germanic or Norse goddess Eostre. The major reference we have is the Venerable Bede, but scholars can’t find any evidence to back up his assertion. The reason this notion is so generally accepted in modern pop-culture is that as far back as the early 1900s modern pagans picked up the idea and ran with it. However, the truth is, it’s much more a neo-pagan fantasy. Fundamentalist Christians have done their share to muddy the waters as well. Early on, they supported this idea, without delving into historical, archeological, or linguistic scholarship on any deep level because certain fundi groups had no truck with the Easter holiday, or any holiday not set out in the Bible for celebration. There you have, as far as I know, the skinny on the word Easter.

Crime Fiction and Sin

Oh goody, we’re getting to the sin part. The fun part.

But this is why I deeply feel crime fiction is well suited to Christian fiction. It deals with sin, with the all too human sin nature. It gets in there and mucks around in the established values of our modern society, or the lack thereof. More than that, a good writer of whodunits explores the human heart. And in Jeremiah we learn the human heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Yes, yes, indeed…this is the realm of the crime fiction writer. I’m getting excited already.

Crime Fiction is a Sin

Now there are those who claim crime fiction itself is sinful, or the writing of it is a sin. Some feel the nature of murder is so sinful that it couldn’t be anything but sinful to write about it, especially the horrid crimes some serial killers have committed. I agree, serial killers are heniously sick individuals. I don’t like to read stories about them, but oddly enough have. I’ve also said I wouldn’t write those types of stories. Yet, I found myself creating a few abhorently sick killers in my Sanctuary Point historical murder mystery series. The fact that these stories are set in the 1940s, a gentler and classier era, didn’t prevent my killers from possessing truly evil hearts.

The Way Some Write Crime Fiction is a Sin

I might as well throw out a few of my pet peeves about the state of crime fiction writing. I hate it when the writer doesn’t get their police procedure set out in an accurate manner. Just as bad is when their detective hasn’t solved the crime so the writer makes the bady guy confess. It’s true you want to surprise the reader regarding the identity of the killer, but hey, come on, it has to be within the realm of possibility. I can go for a coincidence happening once in the story, but if the author has a string of coincidental happenings leading the main character to catch the killer, I’m going to cry foul.

Notes:

1. The Meaning of the Word Easter, by Caedmon Parsons http://www.celtic-catholic-church.org/oak_tree/easter.html

2. Eostre - Teutonic Goddess or NeoPagan Fancy?  by Patti Wigington http://paganwiccan.about.com/od/ostarathespringequinox/qt/Eostre.htm

3. The modern myth of the Easter bunny, by Adrian Bott http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2011/apr/23/easter-pagan-roots

Love, Laugh, Lift in 2013

I’ve decided to be happy this year. The last year had more than it’s share of trauma and angst. Well, to be totally honest…pain, suffering, and anguish.

I’ve made a firm commitment to myself and shared it with God. I will live in joy this year. Actually that’s what He’s been wanting me to do since 2011. Some are slower than others.

On August 28, 2011, after hurricane Irene, the Lord gave me “a word.” Well, three words actually: love, laugh, lift. I was deeply touched by them. I wrote them in my Bible…at the top…in Matthew 5. Since then, I’ve pondered them, sincerely reflected upon them, prayed about them, and shared this wisdom with a few others who I thought were open to hearing.

Since hurricane Sandy affected my city in such a profoundly horrific manner, and since the mass murder in Newtown, I’ve come to understand that the Lord wants me to do more than ruminate over these words. He wants me to live them.

He wants me to have joy in my heart and love others. He wants me to exist in a state of joy and to laugh a lot. He wants me to rely on His grace and lift where I can lift. He wants me to encourage others to love, laugh, and lift.

Gun Toting Mommas ~~ Happy Mother’s Day

When readers think Christian Fiction, they usually don’t think of a “mother character” in terms of a woman with children at home who is carrying a gun. Yet, more than one Christian author has penned mother characters who are packing heat.

Kathy Herman’s THE REAL ENEMY, first in the Sophie Trace Trilogy, comes to mind with its heroine Police Chief Brill Jessup. This police chief got her nickname Brill due to her 18-year career filled with brilliant detective work before accepting the position of police chief in a small town. She most assuredly carries a weapon and knows how to use it.

http://goo.gl/qAaQa

Issie Putnam, the heroine in Fay Lamb’s BECAUSE OF ME is a mom on a mission to keep her son’s insane rapist father from learning about the precious boy she loves. Issie doesn’t like guns, so she carries and .22 caliber pistol and she shoots it with deadly accuracy at its farthest range. Issie and Cole are the only ones who know about the safe room Issie built in the attic of their farmhouse, and Cole knows exactly what he is to do if he ever needs to seek refuge there. No one will hurt Cole, including the man Issie loves. If Michael Hayes can’t see past the ugly truth of Cole’s beginnings and learn to love her son, well, he can’t love her. Even if Michael is the only safe refuge Issie’s heart has ever known. At Amazon. http://goo.gl/6ab3i

Christine’s Lindsay’s heroine Abby Fraser has brought her young son to India intending to begin life with her British Army lieutenant husband now that WWII is over. She’s faced with one disappointment after another, threats, and danger to herself and her son during periods of upheaval in the colonial sub-continent. The wives of British officers have been advised they must learn to be proficient with firearms. Abby, who learned to shoot in the states, shocks them all by repeatedly hitting the bull’s-eye on her first try. SHADOWED IN SILK recently won the 2011 Grace Award in the Action-Adventure/Western/Epic Fiction category.

http://goo.gl/49Vy6

Author Wendy L. Young’s creation, Laura Harmon, is a gun-toting Momma with four kids and a fifth on the way. Licensed to carry a concealed weapon, she knows her rights and knows how to use them. She grew up with a much-older brother who was a Marine and Police Officer and has been married to another officer for over 25 years. Until recently, she never had a cause to use a weapon but things are changing in Campbell Creek and she aims to protect herself and her family. Soon she will have her gun trained and know that she is ready to use it, whatever the cost. This third novel in the series is coming in Summer 2012.  Laura and her husband Will are the main characters in The Campbell Creek Mysteries:  COME THE SHADOWS http://goo.gl/cE0Ax and RED SKY WARNING http://goo.gl/OlJG3 .

*****

I’d like to wish a Happy Mother’s Day to gun toting mommas wherever they may be: in law enforcement, on the battlefield, driving bank armoured cars, and so much more.

A Crime Fiction Twist on Easter/Resurrection Sunday

As we approach Easter, I wanted to bring to everyone’s mind the words of Jesus in Matthew 22:39 [NASB] ~ “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

St. John further expounded upon this theme when he wrote: “The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. ~ 1John 4:8 [NASB]

If there is any over-arching theme I hope to convey in my writing it is that love never fails, never dies, and always triumphs. Some might wonder how I can reconcile this with penning stories that open with a dead body.

While the crime fiction genre (murder mysteries, thrillers, romantic thrillers, police procedurals, suspense novels) can be seen as dark, it also has a “light” side. The good guys often at peril to their own lives fight against evil and for justice. It’s my contention that the “who dun it” originated in the Christian west. The history of the murder mystery is that of solving a moral dilemma (a deadly crime). The main characters may have to sacrifice and endure great punishment to bring the guilty party to justice. Yet they persevere and do what is right.

I’d like to wish everyone who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ a blessed Easter. I’d like to wish my Jewish brothers and sisters a happy, healthy Passover.