Posted on 11/24/2005 3:07:25 PM PST by wouldntbprudent
LANCASTER - Kara Beth Borden was the second girlfriend that David Ludwig took on a long-distance trip without her parents' consent this year.
Confirming a report in a Lancaster newspaper, the Rev. Michael D. Shelley, pastor of the Lititz Christian Church, said Tuesday that Ludwig took a girl to his family's hunting cabin in Juniata County in the spring.
The couple returned voluntarily, Shelley said, adding that he knows the Ludwig family well because they attend his church.
"I know the incident and I know the parents took care of it," Shelley said during a telephone interview Tuesday. "No one else [including police] were involved."
(Excerpt) Read more at pennlive.com ...
What a sick feeling that has to be as they uncover all of this.
This little girl just messed up a lot of lives.
I feel so bad for the younger siblings.
Their mom and dad can never hug them again.
So much loss for them. I do pray someone will take them in that has so much love in their heart.
As for the one planning to get married, this presents a lot of barriers. They are in love and will work it out.
And on some level they have to blame Kara for her stupid disobedience.
I know many are quick to say that's just how teens are. They rebel.
That's why this situation should be an object lesson discussed around the dinner table with kids of an appropriate age.
I posted previously that there didn't seem to be any way for this crime to be avoided, so long as Kara was committed to "being with" Ludwig. If she had obeyed her parents and cooled down the relationship with Ludwig, I believe she quickly would have seen him move on to the next girl.
I read somewhere that the mother has a twin sister.
Last evening I read comments at Lancasteronline.com, in Lancaster, PA.
Most of the comments are on the side of her being involved.
Some place I read comments by teen agers who know Kara. They are shocked.
Makes me think her big change came after she met David Ludwig.
I wonder why life is perceived as so cheap?
No, I don't.
One report I read said the forensic computer analysts quickly identified over 400 pieces of potential evidence on their first pass through of their computers.
I also noticed the prosecuter has not withdrawn the kidnapping charges yet but has announced his intention to do so. Looking from a distance thsi looks like a case that will be settled with a guilty plea.
I checked that site. Why did they throw active cell phones away?
I guess I make a distinction between what I would call "traditional" (for lack of a better word) homicidal violence---gang murders, drug murders, you-dissed-me rage murders, etc.---and people, especially, kids killing because, e.g., their parents impose a curfew.
People may not consciously think life is cheap, but I believe growing up in a culture infused with the idea that if someone, even someone YOU had a part in creating, is inconvenient for you, it's okay to kill that person and throw him in the trash, has consequences. For everyone.
If they threw their cell phones away to avoid being tracked, then BOTH of them were affirmatively trying to avoid capture---i.e., were fugitives. This puts Kara in even more legal jeopardy.
Is it the age of the other person that makes it kidnapping? Can the parent of another child give her a ride home from school and stop at a store first?
I don't think the law covers this as kidnapping. Maybe someone else can shed some light.
One of the best Christian movies I ever saw was Hard Core starring George C. Scott as the Calvinist father who thought he was doing everything right. The theologically astute will recognize it as a remake of the "prodigal son" tale, with a nod to all five points of TULIP calvinism. Parenting can be a white-knuckle ride at times, and it is only God's grace, not our controls, that eventually leads to successful outcomes.
That or she was leaving a trail.
Well, first you have to ~have~ a kidnapping. A couple teenagers sneaking around behind their parents' backs doesn't qualify.
Abortion is probably the most telling example, but the issue seems to me to be even broader. It's the ME-culture, the widespread conviction that nothing and nobody should be allowed to stand in the way of an individual's personal happiness. Obviously, David Ludwig believed that. It seems that Matthew Niedere (the boy from Minnesota who murdered his parents) agreed, as did the friends who helped him. And why wouldn't they? Even the churches today preach a doctrine of Self-Fulfillment.
People have always been most dangerous when their heart is threatened, and that's what they thought was happening here.
What you are describing is the final destination of the abortion culture: moral nihlism.
In this view, the only thing that constitutes a "wrong" is the thing that you somehow view as an obstacle to your personal happiness/fulfillment, etc.
Once culture internalizes the idea that you can go so far as to kill a helpless human being simply because he is inconvenient for you, it is not a large leap to conclude that any time someone or something is inconvenient to you in any way that you are justified in doing whatever it takes to remove the inconvenience.
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