“While you pray, move your feet.”
How is it that we can be both shocked and not the least bit surprised that a person with a rifle, a pistol and a shotgun, all legally purchased, opened fire on a church school in Minneapolis on Wednesday morning?
Two children, one 8-years-old and one 10-years-old, died while they and their classmates prayed in a Catholic school mass. Children. Eight years old. Ten years old. 15 of their fellow students and two adults were also wounded by gunfire.
Watching the news, I considered the collective trauma to everyone involved, along with their parents and family members, friends, the church congregation and the neighbors in the community. The only prayer I could offer was a lament for what these people are experiencing and lament for the lack of national will to do the many things that would make this terrible news something other than routine. Prayers of lament are found in the Bible in the Psalms and the Book of Lamentations. It’s that anger-sorrow-I’m-just-so-damn-angry-sad-frustrated prayer that comes from witnessing or experiencing injustice, cruelty or suffering that comes because of the hatred of another. This is the prayer that is muttered or yelled when we barely have words. My prayer of lament was said to God, but it did not blame God for what we have allowed. It certainly did not suggest I was watching God’s will being reported on the news. My prayer did not ask God to do for us what we refuse to do for ourselves.
You may not know that this is only one of the four mass shootings in America this week. On Tuesday, another person opened fire on a group of people standing on a sidewalk across from a high school, also in Minneapolis, killing one person and injuring six others. You probably missed that horror because we were so flooded with news of a celebrity engagement. In the last few days, America logged other mass shootings you probably didn’t know about. One in California, one in Maryland and one in Missouri. That is 35 people injured and six killed in mass shootings this week.
Network news anchors used to rush to the scene to cover mass shootings at schools. Only CBS News sent a main anchor to Minneapolis on Wednesday night. I don’t fault the major news outlets for realizing that this is not big news to us.
They lowered the American flag over the White House. The Vice President said the White House is “monitoring the situation” in Minneapolis. The Department of Homeland Security issued a statement saying it, too, is “monitoring the situation.” So much monitoring.
There have been 339 mass shootings in America this year. It is the 239th day of 2025 and we have recorded 339 mass shootings. That is one mass shooting every 17 hours. So much to monitor.
A decade ago, President Barack Obama said, “Somehow this has become routine. The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine. The conversation in the aftermath of it. We've become numb to this.”
Without a doubt, by the time you read this, America will notch another mass shooting that won’t make national news. It will be the 340th shooting when it happens, and it will happen. And we will all monitor it, until another celebrity or football game or holiday weekend distracts us. At times like this, we are quite practiced in what to say: “We offer our thoughts and prayers for the victims and their families.” And it is right to pray for the victims and their families. But what are we praying FOR?
Late civil rights leader and congressman John Lewis popularized an African proverb that is sharing space in my heart and mind with my lament. “Pray and move your feet,” Lewis said. When the pain to change is less than the pain of staying the same, we will stop monitoring the situation and do something about it.
The United Methodist Church officially supports efforts to end gun violence, calling for prayer and action, advocating for stricter gun laws, encouraging safe gun storage, and promoting partnerships with other faith and community groups to prevent gun violence. Our stance is outlined in our Book of Resolutions and expressed by the Council of Bishops, who have released statements calling for action and condemning the "idolatry of guns." Here, specifically, is what United Methodists have offered:
The United Methodist Church urges “congregations to advocate at the local and national level for laws that prevent or reduce gun violence.” Some of those measures include:
Universal background checks on all gun purchases;
Ratification of the Arms Trade Treaty;
Ensuring all guns are sold through licensed gun retailers;
Prohibiting all individuals under restraining order due to threat of violence from purchasing a gun;
Prohibiting persons with serious mental illness, who pose a danger to themselves and their communities, from purchasing a gun;
Ensuring greater access to services for those who have mental illness;
Establishing a minimum age of 21 years for a gun purchase or possession;
Banning large capacity ammunition magazines and weapons designed to fire multiple rounds each time the trigger is pulled;
Promoting new technologies to aid law-enforcement agencies to trace crime guns and promote public safety. (Book of Resolutions, 3428)
This feels like a reasonable list. And yet, so many would find part or all of it unacceptable. Ours is the only country in the world that routinely experiences mass shootings at schools. And yes, by all means, pray. But how about having a prayer of lament that really takes in the grief of parents and grandparents whose child died this week while sitting in a worship service in a Catholic church where they were enrolled in school? How about holding a lament so disturbing that we get off our knees and move our feet?
Pray for the shooting victims and their families. And while you pray, move your feet. Three hundred thirty-nine mass shootings in eight months is unacceptable, so why are we accepting it?