On Mass Shooting Our Moral Compass is Shared. Leaders, We Beg You, End This Madness.

#Leadership is not about titles and roles but about how #leaders use their roles for good. To do that with integrity sometimes requires looking away from political party leaders (or company #management) to search inside yourself for what to do. Deep within you: that is where your individual moral compass resides.

This week Texan, father, gun owner and public figure Matthew McConaughey appealed to our collective moral compass. He delivered a sermon to all Americans after an elementary school mass shooting in his hometown of Uvalde. He beseeched us to "reach for, and to grasp, a higher ground, above our political affiliations."

He is right and he is wise.

The topic of "life" - what it means, when it begins and when it ends - is fraught in America. But when it comes to building a world where neighbors and friends, co-workers and kids, grandparents and siblings get together, we agree: we are failing to protect these lives and we must. At higher ground on gun safety we meet on common ground. His moral clarity is our shared truth.

Our collective inner compass tells us that local shoppers deserve to pick out their vegetables and fill their prescriptions and get home alive. Whether we identify as "pro-life" or not, the majority of Americans agree it's wrong for an 18 year-old to purchase military-style high-velocity weapons of war -- and do so legally. Yet that is the world we're building right now.

Preaching from the White House briefing room McConaughey begged leadership of every stripe to act now on sensible gun safety. He echoed the plea from a woman newly-widowed by the murders at Tops Friendly Markets a few weeks earlier: "It's not about Republicans, it's not about Democrats, it's about people, it's about human life." Her husband's life was not protected from such an 18 year-old with a legally-purchased AR-15 style rifle.

The Right to Life Movement Must Demand Action on Gun Safety

Whoever you are, your truth lives within you. It lives in the face you see in the mirror every day that you read in the news about another shooting, another mall parking lot, another church, another grocery store, another elementary school. If you identify as someone who values The Right To Life, then the face you see in the mirror must twist in pain every time the lack of responsible gun laws leads directly to more senseless death. In your core, your sense of goodness must call you to fight for the right to life here as much as anywhere else.

I believe you when you say you care passionately about protecting the lives of the unborn. But if that's what you believe in your soul is the path of righteousness, then that same moral compass surely urges you to fight to protect the innocent lives of people who are born: church goers praying to their God; tourists in town for a special event; bystanders killed by random strangers arguing - both shooting guns they had permits to carry.

Mercifully, as McConaughey told us, on sensible gun laws "we are not as divided as we're being told we are. No." Our collective moral compass points in the same direction.

As a fellow citizen, I urge the Right to Life and Pro-Life leaders and communities to let your voices and values be heard, loud and clear, demanding regulations that are fair to responsible gun owners while putting the protection of life first.

This is a huge opportunity for you to take a stand for the right to life in a new context. Let Congress hear you widen your calls to action from one specific policy to the fundamental value that you treasure. Summon all of the advocacy energy and expertise you have to insist on a world where precious children's lives are secure at school. Clamor for a world where kids can get home safely at night to their parents, and they can play together at the park.

The country needs your leadership right now, making the case on Capitol Hill that your value of life extends to limiting the availability and raising the purchase age for semiautomatic weapons, as well as enforcing background checks, waiting periods, and red flag laws. This is your moment to raise awareness and to join hands across America. Pro-Life values demand action on this now in order to protect and to preserve life. Lead us there and we will follow.