Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Bang! Bang! Pop – Pop – Pop… Gun fire in Scarborough


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Bang! Bang! Pop – Pop – Pop…  Gun fire in Scarborough

Bang! Bang! Pop – Pop – Pop… the sounds last night went on for a while in the midst of over 200 people. Gun fire and bullets flying.

This morning as I looked at the News there is much about the shooting last night in Scarborough, Ontario.

How sad.  One of the people hit by the flying bullets was a child under three years old.  All told there was 19 injured by the gun fire and 2 were killed.  The two that died were a girl in her early teens and a guy in his early twenties.

What kind of a place could this happen in?

Well the address of 193 Danzig Avenue in Scarborough is a relatively quiet place when you look at the Google maps and then click on the Street View man… (try https://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en)

I know this area.  From 1984 to 1991 we lived in Scarborough. I was a Youth Minister, working with all kinds of teens from all kinds of settings.

When we moved from Scarborough to Saskatchewan we left our daughters living in Scarborough on their own.  We moved them into an apartment building north of the 193 Danzig Avenue address.  They lived at Morningside and Ellesmere.

My son-in-law attended University at the U. of T. Scarborough Campus – just a little to the north and east of Danzig.

Our family is very familiar with this area… and might well know some folk from there – if we still lived there.

193 Danzig Avenue is close to home for us.

When I looked at the Map and the Street View offered by Google I could see the large parking lot in front of the Row of apartments… quite likely where the incident took place.

That parking lot is deserted in Street View photo.  But last night there were over 200 people collected there to celebrate at a BBQ.

It is likely a miracle that more than 19(21) were not hit by bullets.  The random act of violence by the men with guns could have hit way more than they did.

There is a “person of interest” that they are seeking now.  People knew who was holding the guns.  And the fact that there were about 21 possible victims – there might have been that many shots – or more.  (But one bullet can pass through two people or more as well.)

It seems that in my life I am reliving the horrible times over and over again.

As good as Scarborough was and with as many good things we saw happen – there were also some nightmares.  This was especially true after we left and our daughters lived alone… with the Scarborough Rapist (likely Paul Bernardo) and gun shots a lot of the time in the area… I had a real problem with what happened. I relived that problem again today.

Last week a man died in our community.  His death spawned more Nightmares.  He was from a group of seniors that opposed almost everything we did at our church at a certain time. He was not necessarily the centre of the problem… but people that he associated with were.

His death brought back horrific memories of that angry group that tried its hardest to kill good ideas.  They wanted things their way and no other way.

Their words were their “bullets”.  Their attitude was there “guns”.

When I heard of his death I mourned in my own way for his family… but remembered his friends… and I shuddered.

Scarborough today has a whole mess of Nightmares that they will be dealing with. People of 193 Danzig will remember the gun fire and the bullets every time they exit their home.  When they see the wounded recovering and the disabilities that will result from gun shots… they will remember. Whenever they see the three young child with the scar from the bullet wound – they will remember.

What has one old man’s death have to do with the Scarborough shooting?

This group of Seniors are going to have to answer someday to someone for their attitudes.  Almost a whole generation of Youth were affected by the attitudes and words of mean and nasty old people there are many scars.

As a Pastor that has worked with the people of the “Gun Culture” in Scarborough and the “Attitude and Nasty Words Culture” of some of Peterborough… I am suffering today with the memories.

These memories are my scars and they are hard to deal with.

Oh Boy!

~ Murray Lincoln ~

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