U.S.

Pope Francis joins prayers for victims of bloody weekend in U.S.

By Rhina Guidos | Catholic News Service
Sunday, August 4, 2019

Mourners take part in a vigil near the border fence between Mexico and the U.S. after a mass shooting at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, Aug. 3, 2019. The Catholic dioceses of El Paso, and neighboring Las Cruces, New Mexico, have joined in prayer after the shooting left several dead and many injured. (CNS /Carlos Sanchez, Reuters)

WASHINGTON — Pope Francis joined Catholic Church leaders expressing sorrow after back-to-back mass shootings in the United States left at least 29 dead and dozens injured in Texas and Ohio Aug. 3 and 4.

After the prayer called the Angelus in St. Peter’s Square on Aug. 4, the pope said he wanted to convey his spiritual closeness to the victims, the wounded and the families affected by the attacks. He also included those who died a weekend earlier during a shooting at a festival in Gilroy, California.

“I am spiritually close to the victims of the episodes of violence that these days have bloodied Texas, California and Ohio, in the United States, affecting defenseless people,” he said.

He joined bishops in Texas as well as national Catholic organizations and leaders reacting to a bloody first weekend of August, which produced the eighth deadliest gun violence attack in the country after a gunman opened fire in the morning of Aug. 3 at a mall in El Paso, Texas, killing 20 and injuring more than a dozen people.

Less than 24 hours after the El Paso shooting, authorities in Dayton, Ohio, reported at least nine dead and more than a dozen injured after a gunman opened fire on a crowd at or near a bar in the early hours of Aug. 4. The suspected gunman was fatally wounded and police later identified him as 24-year-old Connor Betts, of Bellbrook, Ohio.

On Aug. 4, after the second shooting become public, the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the chairman of the bishops’ domestic policy committee offered prayers, condolences and urged action.

“The lives lost this weekend confront us with a terrible truth. We can never again believe that mass shootings are an isolated exception. They are an epidemic against life that we must, in justice, face,” said Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston, USCCB president, in a statement issued jointly with Bishop Frank J. Dewane of Venice, Florida, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development.

“God’s mercy and wisdom compel us to move toward preventative action. We encourage all Catholics to increased prayer and sacrifice for healing and the end of these shootings. We encourage Catholics to pray and raise their voices for needed changes to our national policy and national culture as well,” the statement continued.

Archbishop Dennis M. Schnurr, who heads the Cincinnati Archdiocese, which includes Dayton, said it was “with a heavy heart” that Catholics turned to prayer this Sunday. “As tragic and violent shootings continue in our country,” in El Paso and now Dayton, “I ask for everyone of faith to join in prayer for the victims and their loved ones.

Eric Spina, president of the University of Dayton, said the Marianist-run school and its community offered “our prayers for the families and loved ones of the victims and the wounded, both for our friends and neighbors here in Dayton and in El Paso, Texas.”

In the shooting in El Paso, police arrested 21-year-old Patrick Crusius, of Allen, Texas. Several news organizations said local and federal authorities are investigating whether the shooting was a possible hate crime since the suspected gunman may be linked to a manifesto that speaks of the “Hispanic invasion” of Texas.

In a statement released Aug. 4, Cardinal Cupich said the Archdiocese of Chicago was praying for all of the victims and their families.

“We reject the idea that living in America means risking being gunned down by a killer wielding an assault weapon designed for mass killing. We refuse to become inured to the horrible idea that families must calculate the risk of violent death when considering how to spend a summer weekend,” the statement said. “We cannot tolerate a society in which parents have to wonder whether the child they dropped off in the morning will become another statistic or if their own lives will end that day in their place of work.”

He also said mass shootings “are not an inevitability.”

“All human beings have the right to live without violence. To behave otherwise is to advance a lie. Stopping this lie begins with holding accountable our elected officials who have done nothing to address gun violence. Inaction only cements the idea that these tragedies are acceptable and that the weapons that enable them are simply common features of American life today,” he said. “But we also need to hold accountable those in society, including some leaders, who fuel these violent acts by dividing humanity through hateful rhetoric.

“This must stop — along with the silence of our elected officials who have failed to condemn hate speech, for they are the very ones who have sworn to keep our nation safe. We know that together we can do something to stem the flow of blood. And we call on our elected officials to show us that they know it too.”

The Sisters of Mercy of the Americas posted a prayer on their website called “Let the shooting end.” They called on lawmakers to enact guns laws “to protect all in our society.”

Immediately after the news of the El Paso shooting, they tweeted: “Our hearts break for the families of those killed and wounded in today’s mass shooting in El Paso. A school, a movie theater, a church, a shopping mall: All places where we should feel safe, all places that have experienced senseless tragedy because of guns.”

Cardinal DiNardo and Bishop Dewane said in their Aug. 4 statement that the bishops’ conference has long advocated for responsible gun laws and increased resources for addressing the root causes of violence and called upon the president and congress to set aside political interests “and find ways to better protect innocent life.”

Topics:

  • gun violence
  • mass shooting

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