Once, when I had to work for a living, I was an assistant cameraman on a genuine grade-B movie.

One particular scene called for a dozen or so actors to be brutally gunned down in a barroom massacre. I watched in fascination as the make-up man carefully wired each actor with little capsules filled with stage blood and connected to a machine that would detonate them at the proper time. Little pieces of foam rubber were attached to each capsule so the audience could even revel in pieces of flesh along with the blood flying across the movie screen.

Finally the scene was ready to shoot and we rolled camera. Now I certainly knew what was going to happen and how it was going to happen BUT when it happened...I finished the shot, walked to the nearest restroom and promptly tossed my cookies.

I share this sick story with you in order that you can plainly see my bias regarding violence. Even when I know it is fake, I still get sick.

And so should you.

Surely half of the movies released today contain scenes of graphic violence including brutal sexual acts. We call on Jean Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal to lead us in the path of righteousness as they circumvent a faulty judicial system and blow away the bad guys.

We live in a time when violence is glorified and exalted as the ultimate solution to our problems. We nod our heads and secretly smile while reading of media-heroes riding subways and taking the law into their own hands. We growl that "the punks had it coming."

No one is going to push us around. Right?

Wrong.

The mindless pursuit of violent anarchy that seems to be so popular today on both the screen and in real life will be far more effective in terrorizing our lives than all the thugs who lurk in dark alleys could ever be.

When violence becomes a way of life it becomes easy to justify blowing up a medical clinic because we disagree with a Supreme Court decision or arming ourselves with automatic weapons because we differ with our neighbors or annihilating our entire planet because we don’t agree with somebody’s politics.

The violent life is a sick life.

The Christian way of life stands in dramatic opposition to the violence of today. In the imitation of Christ, we are called to live lives of peace and love, to live lives of mercy and hope, to live lives of the cross.

This may not be a popular stance to take. It is certainly not an easy one but, confronted with the frightening alternatives, it is the only healthy one.