Biden calls out “poison” of white supremacy in address at Mother Emanuel in South Carolina
United StatesRNS President Joe Biden, taking his 2024 reelection campaign to South Carolina, denounced the white supremacy that he said led to deadly violence at Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church almost nine years ago. “The Word of God was pierced by bullets and hate and rage, propelled by not just gunpowder, but by a […]
Sight-Seeing: Practicing prophetic grief
Rev OTIS MOSS III, author, academic and senior pastor of United Church of Christ in Chicago, says that when we grieve pathetically, we may come to imitate our oppressors…
Hurricane Ian strikes South Carolina after deadly march across Florida
Fort Myers, Florida, USReuters A resurgent Hurricane Ian slammed into the South Carolina coast on Friday afternoon, making another landfall after a deadly march across the Florida peninsula that washed away houses and stranded thousands along the state’s Gulf Coast. The storm swept ashore at 2:05pm near Georgetown, a waterfront town about 97 kilometres north […]
In the US, Buffalo shooting latest example of targeted racial violence
AP Black people going about their daily lives – then dying in a hail of bullets fired by a white man who targeted them because of their skin colour. Substitute a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, with a church in South Carolina, and Malcolm Graham knows the pain and grief the families of those killed Saturday are feeling. […]
US court upholds death sentence for church shooter Dylann Roof
Richmond, Virginia, USAP A US federal appeals court Wednesday upheld Dylann Roof’s conviction and death sentence for the 2015 racist slayings of nine members of a Black South Carolina congregation, saying the legal record cannot even capture the “full horror” of what he did. A unanimous three-judge panel of the 4th US Circuit Court […]
Essay: Overturn Dylann Roof’s death sentence – for me, not for him
In an article first published on Religion News Service, Rev SHARON RISHER, whose mother and two cousins were among the nine people murdered by Dylann Roof in a mass shooting at a Charleston church in 2015, writes about why she doesn’t want him to be executed…
With record 69 COVID-19 deaths, US city of Charleston asks for prayer
Columbia, South Carolina, USAP On the same day South Carolina reported a record 69 COVID-19 deaths, the mayor of Charleston asked for spiritual help for people who died in the pandemic, people fighting the virus and their families. Charleston Mayor John Tecklenburg declared Thursday a day of prayer and remembrance in what for centuries has been nicknamed […]
Postcards: Five years after shooting, Mother Emanuel uneasily adapts as pilgrimage site
In an article first published on Religion News Service, MATTHEW J CRESSLER, assistant professor of religious studies at the College of Charleston, reflects on how congregants of the Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church have coped in the wake of the 2015 mass shooting in which nine church members were killed…
Five years after church massacre, Charleston officials to remove statue of slavery advocate
Updated: 5.15pm AESTColumbia, South CarolinaAP Despite a South Carolina law protecting monuments, officials in the historic city of Charleston announced Wednesday that they plan to remove a statue of slavery advocate John C Calhoun from a downtown square. Mayor John Tecklenburg announced he will send a resolution to the City Council to remove the statue […]
As Emanuel AME documentary screens, survivors, families mull grief and guns
Washington, DCRNS Felicia Sanders, who survived the shooting four years ago at Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, told a tale of two Bibles. First, there was the holy book she used for the Bible study the shooter infiltrated that Wednesday night in June of 2015, returned to her after she […]