One person was killed and more than 20 others injured in Kansas City on Feb. 14, 2024, as gunfire rang out at that city's Super Bowl victory celebration.
Bishop Deon Johnson offers reflection, prayer, and resources in response to this gun violence.
A message from the Bishop
“How lonely sits the city that once was full of people!” –Lamentations 1:1
Weeping and lamentation has once again replaced shouts of celebration and joy as the tragic scourge of gun violence shatters the lives of families in Kansas City and across the nation. Once again, like our biblical ancestors, we cry out in anguish and pain as one more mass shooting irreparably shatters the lives of countless families.
We pray for the repose of the soul of Lisa Lopez-Galvan and for comfort and strength for her family and friends. We pray also for the other twenty-one victims, eleven of whom are children under the age of fifteen. We pray especially for their families as they begin to process the trauma of an occasion for joy and celebration transformed into terror and trauma.
The “thoughts and prayers” offered by our elected leaders ring hollow as we see our children growing up in a world where tragedy is quickly becoming the norm in too many communities.
As people of faith, we look to God, the author of our being, in times of loss and pain. I invite you to hold Lisa, and all the victims of gun violence in your prayers, especially in this Lenten season. Lent calls us to a time of repentance and reflection, through prayer and fasting, that we may amend our lives and chart a new course towards God’s dream of Beloved Community.
May we in our corporate worship and individual practice repent of the sins of negligence, inaction, willfulness and silence perpetrated on our behalf. And may we with contrite hearts rededicate ourselves to ensuring that no families, no children, no beloved child of God should be scarred or marred by the specter of gun violence.
May God in Christ give us the will and the courage to stand for the cause of right and be champions for common sense gun laws here in Missouri and across our nation.
The Rt. Rev. Deon K. Johnson,
Eleventh Bishop of The Episcopal Diocese of Missouri
Prayer
Inspire us, O God, with the gift of shalom, the gift of wholeness and the promise of your presence.
Give us wisdom to seek nonviolence as an answer to the violence of our lives and world.
Give us courage to seek wholeness in a fractured and divided world, to find reconciliation rather than revenge, to abandon the instruments of violence and death and entrust our lives, our homes and our families to you.
May your presence fill us and others with the thirst for unity, wholeness, and the desire to see all people valued as created in your image.
May we and others receive your Shalom that we might be faithful instruments of your love. Amen.
(Adapted from Episcopal Peace Fellowship, "Gift of Shalom")
Contact your state lawmakers
The Diocese of Missouri now has an easy way for you to communicate with your state lawmakers and live out your baptismal covenant and the mission of our church.
Learn about Voter Voice and send a message to our representatives about proposed gun laws.
Resources
We join in prayer with our siblings in the Diocese of West Missouri in offering these special liturgies and resources:
Liturgy in Response to Mass Shootings