The following student report was submitted by Ambassador League Agent Lauren L. during the 2008-2009 League.
Mission: Research - Sanctity of Life
Last Tuesday morning, seven bodies were found at the Lupoe residence in Los Angeles. Upstairs, a pair of two-year-old twin boys and their mother. Downstairs, three daughters, ages eight, five, and five and their father. Who could have done such a horrible thing? The mother and the father.
The week previous to the murders, Ervin Lupoe was having trouble at work. The employment officers at Kiaser Permaente, the hospital both he and his wife had been recently hired at, were not satisfied with them and were rethinking their decision to take them on as employees. Both Ervin and his wife Ana were fired and it was reported by Ervin that his boss told him "You should not even had bothered to come to work today, you should have blown your brains out." Angry that the man would even suggest this, Ervin went home –and did what he said. He shot all five children, then his wife and finally himself. But before he did, he sent a letter to the Los Angeles ABC news station. In the letter, he explains the ordeal at the hospital and the effect it had on his life. At the end of the letter, he stated this:
"So after a horrendous ordeal my wife felt it better to end our lives and why leave our children in someone else’s hands, in addition it seems Kiaser Permanente want’s us to kill ourselves and take our family with us. They did nothing to the manager who stated such, and did not attempt to assist us in the matter, knowing we have no job and five children under 8 years with no place to go. So here we are."
At the end of the letter, in handwritten pen, it said 'OH LORD MY GOD IS THERE NO HOPE FOR A WIDOW'S SON?"
Ervin and Ana Lupoe had lost their jobs and they had no idea why. They felt that the world had taken something from them so they took something from it: five innocent lives. Their beautiful children, all under eight years old, died because they felt cheated. How did they justify murdering their children? By saying that they wouldn’t want anyone else to care for them. Perhaps being with anyone other than their parents would have truly been the saving deed.
This raw uprooting of a life, a life that was handmade by God and specifically placed on Earth to fulfill His will, is just wrong. It destroys the sanctity of life. Humans are not the ones who decide when life ends - God is. He is the One with the plans for each one of us and he has decided when we shall breathe our last breath.
Genesis 1:27 says, "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." He breathed life into us, so that we could please Him.
Ecclesiastes 6:12 says, "For who knows what is good for a man in life, during the few and meaningless days he passes through like a shadow? Who can tell him what will happen under the sun after he is gone?" We may not see the whole picture of life, but we need to trust that God does. He understands our struggles and will help us push through them. He will, and does, give us life. We need to respect that.
