Political Quotes

“I listened to my colleague on the other side. I still think about the night of June 17, 2015, when at about 9:00 in the evening, I received a phone call informing me that something had happened at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, a church that I know very well and the members I know very well. Much to my dismay, I learned later in the evening that a Bible study that was taking place at that church had welcomed in a stranger. I grew up in a parsonage, and I grew up learning that which we find there in the book of Hebrew, the 11th chapter: Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen. These people were practicing their faith, a faith that taught them to welcome in a stranger. A stranger came to their door, and they welcomed him into their Bible study. They sat down, and he sat with them for an hour. In the further practice of their faith, as they concluded their Bible study, they rose to pray, and with bowed heads, only to open their eyes to the sound of gunfire. The stranger that they had welcomed in opened fire and killed nine of them, one of whom was the pastor, a former intern of mine. Now, we later found out that the gentleman who perpetrated this crime was a white supremacist that studied the history of that church; and because it was the most historic African-American church in South Carolina, he targeted that church and its worshippers. However, he should not have had the gun.…”