The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A year after nine killings, church celebrates love over hate
Charleston’s Emanuel AME ‘has grown stronger,’ member says.
CHARLESTON, S.C. — Who knows when the Lord will speak? The Rev. Anthony Thompson didn’t anticipate hearing from the Almighty in that courtroom, but God has his own agenda, his own time.
A voice told him to stand. Thompson rose on legs he no longer controlled. He walked to the courtroom lectern. He raised his eyes and looked at a face devoid of love.
Thompson, recalling that moment Wednesday, paused. The light of a fading day shone through stained glass in the sanctuary of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, where nine people were shot and killed a year ago today. Among them: Myra Thompson, with whom Anthony Thompson had shared
disappointments, dreams, children. His wife was gone.
What next came from his mouth in that hearing, said Thompson, emanated from a higher authority.
“I forgive you,’” Thompson said in that Charleston County courtroom. “My family forgives you.
“But you’ve got to repent. You’ve got to confess. You’re in a lot of trouble.”
Trouble came 12 months ago. It arrived with the boom of a handgun and the screams of innocents, with the clattering of shells on a basement floor. In the year since police say Dylann Roof killed nine church-goers here, it’s resurfaced in other places — most recently, and most awfully, in Orlando. Gunman Omar Mateen killed 49 people in a gay nightclub, wounding 53 more. Police call it an act of domestic terrorism, a hate crime.
In Charleston, that latest carnage is a reminder that hate stalks the land. But love is stronger.
And nowhere, perhaps, were our better angels on display than at the church, Mother Emanuel, earlier this week. The good folks of Charleston came here late Wednesday afternoon to commemorate the Bible study that ended in gunfire and blood the night of June 17, 2015.
Thompson, a minister at Holy Trinity Reformed Episcopal Church, led church members and visitors in studying a segment of Chapter 4 of the Book of Mark. A year earlier, his wife had led a study of that same passage. It was the last thing she and the rest of the Emanuel Nine ever read.
The Scripture tells the parable of the seeds. A farmer spreads them. Some land on rocks, and bear nothing. Weeds choke others. The sun scorches even more. But some come to rest in fertile ground; they flower and spread.
The story, so simple and so profound, is a guide for the faithful, said Thompson. Live the way Jesus taught: Spread seeds of good will, and watch love flower. Feel the blessing from above.
It worked for Thompson, even while his words of forgiveness echoed in Roof ’s court hearing nearly 12 months earlier.
“The funny thing is,” he recalled this week, “I immediately began to experience peace.”
‘Done great things’
Emanuel was built to last. In 200 years it’s weathered social and natural storms. It’s constructed of stone and wood — and, in equal measure, of faith and hope. No roof can stop the heavenly ascent of prayers uttered here.
In the year since the killings, it has become a shrine for resident and visitor alike. On a recent afternoon, flowers, beads and other adornments decorated an arch that faces the sidewalk. A note of encouragement to the church, written in a girlish scrawl, flapped in a hot wind. They are periodically removed, but more take their place.
The Rev. Dr. Brenda Nelson, a longtime church member, has seen those memorials appear since the shootings. She’s also witnessed what the Lord has accomplished in the year since a Bible study welcomed a stranger, Nelson said.
“He’s done great things,” said Nelson, who welcomed visitors to Wednesday’s Bible study. The 80-minute session began with prayer and ended the same way. In between were song, laughter and a shared optimism that the Lord would set things right.
“Because of what God allowed to happen ... the church has grown stronger,” she said. “We will keep going forward.”
But it’s nearly impossible to go forward without an occasional backward glance. Emanuel knows.
Roof has seen his plans backfire. He wanted to start a race war. In the past year, Charlestonians have tried harder than ever to get along. A memorial service planned Friday is expected to draw thousands to the College of Charleston, where President Barack Obama paid a moving tribute to the victims one year ago.
In social media postings, Roof wrapped himself in the Confederate battle flag — not to proclaim heritage, but to proffer hate. Since the shootings, it’s been removed from the Capitol in South Carolina and other places where it once commanded center stage.
On Wednesday night, his plans failed spectacularly. As the Bible study ended, stranger approached stranger. A tall white guy hugged a shorter black man. A blond with a sleepy black child draped over her shoulder shook hands with an older woman. An elderly black man said hello to a white man probably half his age.
As members and visitors left the sanctuary, they stepped into a rainfall that pattered across the city before vanishing. Behind it came a rainbow.
Who knows when the Lord will speak, and how?