By ABBY
GOODNOUGH and ARIANA GREEN
Published: March 17, 2009
CHICHESTER, N.H. — Residents who turned out for a town meeting here
last week expected to vote on a budget, a repaving project and a plan to protect historic stone walls. They did not expect the announcement that a convicted child killer was their newest neighbor.
The stunned crowd learned that the killer, Raymond
Guay, who recently served 35 years in prison, was staying with a minister, his wife and their five children in their home on a rural road dotted with other young families.
The town has been gasping ever since, with the police stepping up
patrols, the elementary school sending cautionary letters home with students, and neighbors of Mr. Guay’s host, the Rev. David Pinckney, seeking weapons.
“A lot of people in town are planning on getting pistol permits,” said
Kenneth Smith, a father of two who lives across the street from the Pinckneys. “I pulled out a hunting gun, and I’m keeping it close by.”
Mr. Guay was convicted of killing a 12-year-old boy in Hollis, N.H., in
1973, chasing him into the woods before shooting him in the eye. After escaping from a state prison in 1982, he held two residents of nearby Concord hostage in their home. He was later sent to a federal prison in California, where he got in more trouble for stabbing an inmate in 1990.
“I’d be derelict in my duties if I didn’t have some concerns,” said the
Chichester police chief, Patrick Clarke, who said he was sending a patrol car by the Pinckney residence once an hour.
While Mr. Pinckney has defended Mr. Guay as a “follower of Jesus” and a changed man — and said Mr. Guay would be his guest for two months at most — people like Katheryne Ingram, a mother of four who lives nearby, are not convinced.
“The reverend keeps touting this as a Christian thing to do,” Ms.
Ingram said of Mr. Pinckney, pastor of River of Grace Church, an evangelical congregation in Concord. “But I’m Christian, too, and I don’t agree that he should put us at risk without even having asked.”
Read the rest of the story here.
HT: Creation Project
1 comment:
The anxiety exhibited by the neighbors is understandable. I think it is a natural reaction.
But of course, natural does not always mean right does it?
In Paul's letters to the Corinthians he describes being natural in opposition to being spiritual. What the Pastor in the story is doing seems quite unnatural to his neighbors. They don't under stand it. Listen to Paul:
But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.
(1Co 2:14 NASB)
Paul also says those that are in Christ are NEW creations. He said the old has passed away and the new has come (ref 2 Cor 5:17).
This, again is something that we naturally resist. "You can't teach an old dog new tricks," right?
This is, however, NOT the message of Christ.
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