Reflections from the Event

It’s difficult to find hope in such a dark season in America, but I found it on the first floor of the East Wing Rotunda, adjacent to the escalators. Surrounded by clergy from diverse faith traditions, survivors, and community leaders, we prayed and sang as one voice. We began with a prayer for responsible leadership – “a longing for elected officials to exercise their duties, always feeling the weight of the responsibility bestowed on them by their people.”  

Our litany included prayers for victims, surivors–the friends and family left behind, first responders, perpetrators, and those who feel helpless in face of the American gun violence epidemic. Although prayers focused on Pennsylvania legislators, victims, and communities, we gathered four days after Alex Pretti was shot 10 times by ICE agents in Minneapolis. Our closing prayers called to bear witness and “stand as one people against the violence that has touched every corner of every part of our country.”

Some legislators stopped to listen. Others paused to look down from the second floor as our voices lifted. Some offered averted glances from escalators. Their reactions reminded me that bearing witness is not always acknowledged but always essential. Hope lives where people join together.    —- Anne Demo

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