You don’t expect to get shot for going to church but that is exactly what happened to members of the congregation of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina last week. Nine people aged between 26 and 87 were shot during a bible study, allegedly by Dylann Storm Roof. America is once again in uproar.
How do we come to terms with such appalling tragedy? In our own country, we don’t need to think for long before remembering Hungerford, Dunblane and Lockerbie. These events and others like them show the ugly face of evil in the few who brutally take the lives of the innocent many. Shock and anger are usually the first reactions. We align ourselves with the victims and their families and demonise the perpetrators.
In the days that follow such events we usually ask what lessons we can learn and pledge it must never happen again. But it always does …
In the face of hatred, fear and violent death it is easy to feel impotent and resigned. People of faith remind us of the need for forgiveness, even for the wicked. But surely it isn’t possible to offer forgiveness to a gunman who kills you at your prayers, is it? Well, apparently, it is.
Relatives of the victims have told Dylann Roof “I forgive you”. They have prayed for him and in their grief reached out with love. This may seem incredible and even naively useless but ridiculous as it may appear, self-giving love is the only response we can make.
To love and forgive the darkest and most depraved is desperately hard and seldom a choice we make but it will release us from hatred and division. It will heal us and it will save us. “Perfect love casts out fear”, the Bible tells us. I challenge you to try it.
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