But in the grand scheme of wickedness, the death of a lion – even a lion called Cecil — barely registers on the most sensitive Richter scale.  The pathetic tears of a Kimmel and the predictable verbal violence of the hashtag wielding rent-a-mobs of the internet merely witness to the complete lack of any real moral compass and proportion in modern society.  It no doubt makes them all feel good and righteous to stand up for a lion.

 
There is a moment towards the end of the film, Calvary, where the priest – a good, innocent priest — is kneeling on the beach with a parishioner (a victim of some other priest’s abuse) pointing a gun at his head. The parishioner asks the priest if he cried when he found his beloved dog slain outside his house some nights previously. The priest acknowledges that he did. The parishioner then asks him – the good priest, the priest who has abused no child – if he cried when he heard of the children abused by priests. There is silence. Horrible, obvious silence.

I thought of this when I saw the footage of Jimmy Kimmel tearing up on his late night chat show as he told the audience of the shooting of Cecil the Lion. I wonder – did Kimmel tear up when he saw the video of the Planned Parenthood doctor talking about crushing infants as so many organ factories? Does he tear up when he reads accounts of late term abortions? Does he tear up when he hears of famine and disease? Does he tear up when he hears of Christians facing death for their faith in other parts of the world?

I am an Englishman. We are notorious for caring more about our dogs than our neighbours. On the whole, we prefer animals to people. So make no mistake, I find the shooting of big game to be a distasteful thing. But in the grand scheme of wickedness, the death of a lion – even a lion called Cecil — barely registers on the most sensitive Richter scale. The pathetic tears of a Kimmel and the predictable verbal violence of the hashtag wielding rent-a-mobs of the internet merely witness to the complete lack of any real moral compass and proportion in modern society. It no doubt makes them all feel good and righteous to stand up for a lion. It is just a pity that so few of them actually care as deeply about other human beings.

Carl Trueman is professor of historical theology and Paul Woolley chair of church history at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This article is used with permission.