Obama Attacks on Guns & Religion are Assaults on Freedom

Titusville, FL –“The Obama attacks on freedom of religion and on the right to keep and bear arms reflect the administration’s intolerance of individual freedom,” John M. Snyder said here today. He’s the senior rights activist in Washington, according to Shotgun News.

Snyder said, “The Obama assault on religious freedom is despicable. Its mandate to force people to act against their religious conscience in insurance payment for abortion is tyrannical.

“Let us support firmly the Fortnight for Freedom initiated by Catholic bishops in the United States to call attention to and hopefully reverse the administration’s mandate. The initiative, now in its second year, is a two week program of prayer and action concluding on the Fourth of July.”

Snyder stated that, “The assault on religion is like the assault on gun rights. The assaults come from the same sources, the freedom haters. These are people who believe that the state is superior to and determinative of individual freedom.

“The Catholic bishops should realize this. They should not let themselves be sucked foolishly into attacks on freedom, as some of them have in the past with their public support for restrictive gun control.”

“They should realize that promotion of abortion and promotion of gun control are two sides of the attack on life,” Snyder continued. “People own guns so they can protect their lives and others’ lives from criminal assault, as well as for other reasons. One hundred million Americans own 300 million rifles, shotguns and handguns. Over 10 million firearms are sold to citizens each year. Recent studies by the U.S. Department of Justice and the Pew Research Center reveal that as private firearms ownership increases, firearm-related homicide decreases.

“Anti-gun propaganda and emotionally-charged media attention to high-profile murders create a false impression. The truth is that relaxations of restrictions on gun carrying correlate with reductions of rates of murder and other violent crimes, as scholarly studies, such as those by Professor John Lott, have demonstrated. Generally, guns save lives.”

Snyder said, “Bishops who say they support a right to life and then turn around and support unreasonable restrictions on guns used to protect life render themselves subject to charges of rank hypocrisy. They risk causing suspicion about the church they supposedly serve and undermine evangelization efforts. They risk being characterized as ‘useful idiots’ for serving the agenda of the enemies of freedom, right to life and right to defend life.

“That is the epitome of stupidity.”

About John Snyder:
Named the Gun Dean by Human Events, “the senior rights activist in Washington” by Shotgun News, a “champion of the right to self-defense” by The Washington Times, and “dean of gun lobbyists” by The Washington Post and The New York Times, John M. Snyder has spent 45 years as a proponent of the individual Second Amendment civil right to keep and bear arms as a National Rifle Association editor, public affairs director of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, treasurer of the Second Amendment Foundation, and founder of www.GunRightsPolicies.org.

A former Jesuit seminarian, Snyder is founder/manager of Telum Associates, LL.C., founder/chairman of the St. Gabriel Possenti Society, Inc., a director of Council for America, and serves on the boards of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and the American Federation of Police & Concerned Citizens. He is also the author of the book Gun Saint. Visit: www.GunRightsPolicies.org