Homeschooled, conservative family, murderous?

Matthew Murray - 24, raised in a Bible-teaching home - walked into a church and a parachurch ministry a few days ago firing gun shots at Christians. Murray then died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. We may never know why this happened but Murray's life, as associated on the ex-Pentecostal website "Azusa Street Survivors," paints a chilling narrative. Murray's screen name is thought to be "nghtmrchld26." The FBI has pulled several posts by nghtmrchld26 that speak with detail about shootings, being homeschooled, and rejected by YWAM.

The Associated Press reports nghtmrchld26 saying on Sunday, "I'm coming for EVERYONE soon and I WILL be armed to the @ %$ teeth and I WILL shoot to kill."

Describing his daily home life on December 24, 2006 nghtmrchld26 wrote, "We had bible memory, hymn singing, and prayer for at least the first two hours of the day growing up all the way till age 18. I don't think it worked at keeping me in their system though."

He also seems to resent religious people who wed Christianity with Republican politics: "I remember growing up in pentecostalism/evangelicalism, we were always told to support the republicans/conservatives and to 'hate those evil satanic democrats.' Jesus never said to put our trust in any political leader, yet we see so many christians trying sooooo hard to believe that 'America was founded on fundamentalist evangelical christianity' and we must turn america back towards God!!!"(January 14, 2007)

What are we to learn from this? We may remember that the shooter of the Virgina Tech massacre, Seung-Hui Cho, who killed 32 people and wounded many more, before committing suicide, was also reared in a suburban conservative evangelical context. Both Murray and Cho experienced rejection and pain from the Church and retaliated later. The two seem to have amazing similarities in their stories of conservative Christianity and experiencing rejection by the "beautiful people."

Cho was rejected by kids in his youth group. On May 8, 2007 Murray alleges that YWAM rejected him because he wasn't cool enough, "social enough," and too "introverted." Murray then laments, "If you're an extrovert, and popular, then yes, there is plenty of love waiting for you in christianity."

What, if anything, is happening in evangelical sub-culture that seems to be producing a generation of angry, vengeful young men (and angry middle-aged blogging men)? As the story of Murray's life unfolds, I'm sure we will learn more about whether or not his perceptions were actually true. For now, it seems that evangelicals may need to start paying more attention to what's happening to young men. Over the years I've seen this more and more in youth and college culture: In order to be loved by the masses one needs to look like an Abercrombie and Fitch model, be extremely outgoing, and publicly sinless. There are even some ministries and churches over the years that targeted "popular" kids in high schools and colleges to draw others. Many young people perceive this to be the case in the church and harbor anger.

Go for the influencers, right? Shouldn't the church be different, some ask?

In the end, it will be difficult to reconcile this evil violence with a confession of faith like the one written on April 2, 2007 by nghtmrchld26.

For me, yes, "Jesus is the way" indeed. Jesus is an archetype, the perfect man and divine at the same time. Indeed, we all need to be "more like Christ" as in reality, we all have the spark of divinity within all of us. I have found the becoming like Christ is not something that suddenly happens after converting in a church or saying a sinner's prayer, this is evident. Rather we become "like-Christ" as we trod The Path, awakening to more and more light. Jesus didn't say "pray the sinners prayer" but rather "he that believeth on me shall have everlasting life." How do I "have faith in Christ"? Well, by believing in the mystery and archetype of the Christ, knowing that humanity is not without hope and that the Divine Plan will indeed be fulfilled.

Arvada police spokeswoman Susan Medina won't confirm that nghtmrchld26 is Murray. Sadly, he's an influencer now. Nghtmrchld26 has not posted since the horror unfolded Sunday.