Gunman's postings: 'America, this is YOUR Columbine'

By Alan Gathright, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Originally published 08:45 a.m., December 12, 2007
Updated 04:16 p.m., December 12, 2007

Richard Werner / Special to the Rocky

Matthew Murray is pictured playing a song at a Youth With A Mission event Dec. 14, 2002.

In searing Web rants, Matthew Murray vowed revenge against Christianity and the missionary school he claimed "rejected" him as he slid into a deepening depression and state of self-destruction.

"Christian America...this is YOUR Columbine," Murray warned in a posting at 9:33 a.m. Sunday — after killing two young people at the Youth With A Mission school in Arvada and hours before he would kill two others and himself at a Colorado Springs megachurch.

"I've heard all the sermons on salvation and s---...I've looked everywhere for spiritual truth," he wrote under the persona "DyingChild_65" at a Google forum called alt.suicide.holiday.

"All I found in christianity was hate, abuse (sexual, physical, psychological, and emotional), hypocrisy, and lies."

One Web viewer was so alarmed by Murray's Web writings that the person contacted the FBI after the Arvada shootings Sunday morning.

Federal agents and Arvada police began a frantic search for Murray, but were unable to stop him before his rampage continued at New Life Church in Colorado Springs. Murray killed himself after a church security guard shot him.

Murray also complained bitterly about being abused during 12 years of strict, Bible-based home-schooling.

"I remember the beatings and the fighting and yelling and insane rules and all the Bill Gothard bull---- and then trancing out," he wrote Dec. 1 under the monicker "nghtmrchld26" on a Web forum for former Pentecostal Christians. Bill Gothard is the founder of the Institute in Basic Life Principles in Illinois, which promotes Christian home-education program.

"I remember how it was like every day was Mission Impossible trying to keep the rules or not get caught and just...survive every single (expletive) day," Murray wrote.

It's hard to determine which of Murray's writings are fact or fiction.

He also claimed: "I've been through alcohol and drug addiction, and recently a divorce, my parents kicked me out at age 15, I can't go to college because I don't have money and I have kids to support."

Yet, there's no indication that the 24-year-old Murray, who lived with his parents in Arapahoe County, was ever married or had children.

His Web tirades frequently complaint that the Youth With A Mission training center in Arvada unfairly "rejected" him for being introverted and too questioning during his 2002 missionary training.

"YWAM, and christianity, it's all about the Beautiful People," the 24-year-old Murray wrote May 8 as nghtmrchld26.

He washed out of YWAM's six-month program after alarming classmates and instructors by talking to his inner "voices," spreading rumors about group homosexuality in the men's shower room and singing dark rock songs as a Christmas celebration.

During his ill-fated missionary training, Murray wrote, "I witnessed all kinds of insanity. Men would be making out with other men in the hallways, listening to all kinds of "metal music"(non-christian), smoke pot with each other while off base, there were rumors of sexual activity, both hetero and homosexual."

The Web posting echoes the rumors that Murray spread at the YWAM program in 2002, said Richard Werner, who bunked next to the troubled teen for four months. Such rumor-mongering irked other classmates and caused them to complain to school officials.

"Yeah, this was one of the things that he used to gossip about," Werner said. "This was like the things that people really started to get angry (about)."

The ex-roommate said Murray would not shower with the others in the communal men's bathroom, saying: "Because I know what you guys are doing ... You all go to your (communal) bathroom and then you start dancing with each other, touching each other."

While he is sympathetic to Murray's tragic end — and the pain the gunman's family has suffered — Werner believes his classmate created many conflicts about the center in his head.

Werner said school leaders settled problems and administered discipline fairly and openly, treating all students the same.

Contrary to the Web rants about the missionary school, Werner said: "YWAM was always a very honest, serious institute, where those kinds of things are obviously not allowed."

After the shootings, YWAM issued a statement saying Murray left the Discipleship Training School because "program directors felt that issues with his health made it inappropriate for him" to complete the course.

Yet, in the May posting, nghtmrchld26 writes: "Why was I told that I couldn't be a missionary because I wasn't "social enough"? I was told that I was "an introvert."

He criticized "the authoritarianism and hypocrisy" of "YWAM leaders (who) would always believe that they had some special 'connection to God.'"

"The fact is, in YWAM, and christianity, it's all about the Beautiful People," he wrote. "No, it's not just 'one group of bad christians' but rather...almost every group of christians except for a few open minded non-evangelical churches.

"If you're an extrovert, and popular, then yes, there is plenty of love waiting for you in christianity. If you ask questions and want to understand things and/or desire a real and deep spirituality, or if you're just not popular...well...you are considered as one of the horrible people and are either going to be abused or kicked out by 'holy spirit love filled' christians."

Nghtmrchld26 claimed to have engaged in "cutting," carving self-inflicted cuts and nicks in his skin — a disorder that tends to afflict young people.

He wrote:

"Come and sing with me

This beautiful song of sadness and misery

Cutting ourselves

Crying awash in crimson

"....As all the pain fades away

Taking your last breath

As the blood and pain drains

Leaving everyone....to die in their misery and hypocrisy

We're going home to a beautiful place far away from here."

In an August posting titled "Drowning in despair," nghtmrchld26 launches into a poem about "Crying all alone," writing:

"As I see everyone going on with their meaningless vain fake lives

All the posers and wannabes

All the abusers..."

Murray says he found consolation in "Cutting myself/High off the pain and darkness..."

"Seeing so many fakers hating me

So many of my friends who have abandoned me

So many spiritual pretenders who failed to help me.

I'm your nightmares come true

You think you can punish me but you fail to see

That I've lived through a thousand nightmares

And all your worst Christian fears are coming true"

• December 12, 2007

  4:02 p.m.

  Suggest removal

  ramblinrose writes:

  I understand his frustration with the Christian Community and yet it is obvious he felt turned away and denied by the very community that said it would love him unconditionally. Nevertheless, I cannot fail to see he became what he accused others of. In the end it is absolutely apparent he needed help. As with all mental illness and those who are mentally ill, we find that those are the very people society chooses to avoid. The very people society chooses to ignore. The very people who need our help the most. It is easy to blame only him, blame his family too but it isn't that simple. Are you responsible for what he did? No. Am I? No. Is YWAM responsible? Of course not. Nevertheless, he feel through the cracks. What he did was wrong. What he did was sinful. I am not saying that I don't think he should be held accountable. I do. Perhaps there is hell. He will spend a long time there if he ever gets out. In the end I can only hope that others like him will not choose the same fate. But perhaps will find help where they will not be forsaken or eschewed but despite their illnesses, find a special place where they can grow out of their selfish hate. One can always hope.

• December 12, 2007

  4:35 p.m.

  Suggest removal

  Wolfgang writes:

  Good job. Publish his photo and his manifesto. That'll sure dissuade other copycats from trying to get their 15 minutes of fame too.

• December 12, 2007

  9:51 p.m.

  Suggest removal

  me2 writes:

  only if they are mentally ill, then it doesn`t make any difference what you print or don`t print.