Following the horrific shooting that took place at Coventry School in Nashville, Tennessee in March 2023, FOR-USA began to organize faith leaders to call for Mother’s Day to be a national day of prayer, mourning, repentance and contemplation about our nation’s gun violence epidemic. Before the initiative was complete, the second most deadly mass shooting of 2023 took place at an outlet mall in Texas.
The Texas shooter was a follower of Nazi ideology, and like Proud Boy Jeremy Bertino (who participated in a Christian nationalist group prayer the night before the Jan. 6 insurrection and later pled guilty to seditious conspiracy), he was affiliated with the extremist group Right Wing Death Squad. The intertwining epidemics of racist hatred, gun violence and other forms of violence, and Christian nationalism are impossible to ignore.
Rather than just throwing up our arms in despair and helplessness, we redoubled our efforts and gathered over 650 faith leaders to support using the Mother’s Day observance to galvanize us into action so that we are able to overcome our country’s idolatrous worship of guns.
Our efforts were covered in Religious News Service, placed in front of President Biden’s eyes (sadly, he didn’t respond), and entered by Rep. Jonathon L. Jackson (Illinois, District 1) into the official Congressional Record. We won’t stop until it’s safe to shop for groceries, visit houses of worship and send children to school.