A Republican lawmaker in California who disagrees with President Barack Obama’s effort to prevent mass shootings says that guns are an “absolutely essential” part of God’s plan.

“Guns are used an average of 3 million times a year according to the Clinton Justice Department,” Assemblyman Tim Donnelly told the Christian talk radio show The Bottom Line on Wednesday. “That’s like 6,900 times a day. That’s the high end of the statistics, other people say it’s only 200 times a day.”

“Whatever that number is, they are used to defend human life,” he explained. “They are used to defend our property and our families and our faith and our freedom, and they are absolutely essential to living the way God intended for us to live.”

Following the president’s proposal to curb gun violence on Wednesday, Donnelly blasted Obama for “politicizing this tragedy to impose an anti-Second Amendment agenda that would have done nothing to prevent the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary.”

More: California Lawmaker: Guns Are ‘Essential to Living the Way God Intended’