Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - It was standing room only Monday at Saint Martin de Porres Roman Catholic Church as communities of multiple faiths gathered for Do Not Let Your Heart Be Troubled, an interfaith prayer service commemorating the ten lives lost in the horrific Jefferson Avenue shooting.
Communities of multiple faiths came together led by the Fifteenth Bishop of the Diocese of Buffalo, Most Rev. Michael W. Fisher alongside Cantor Irwin German, Pastor James Giles, Pastor Tim Brown, Imam Syed Khalilulla Qadri, Father Paul Siel and Father Peter Ekanem.
The service began with a call to prayer and an opening hymn entitled, Heal the Land.
Following that was the reading of the Koran and the Gospel.
Pastor James Giles recounted a story shared with him of a young girl who hid behind the refrigerators at the Tops, "They (bullets) were going through the milk cartons and the milk was flowing but they wouldn't go through the metal doors which means the shooter was likely shooting at them while they were hiding in a refrigerator," said the Pastor.
"My heart was bleeding for them and then I told her, 'Listen, try to calm the girl and take her somewhere.' Once she tried to take her to the store, she was crying out not ever wanting to go in the store again. I thought about the trauma that this child was going to face the rest of her life about encountering public spaces including schools," said Pastor Giles.
Pastor Tim Brown told a story of driving in a town filled with Confederate flags and a lady asking if it offended him, "If we're going to have a realistic conversation about race, we first have to take out the images. We have to take out the ideology that talked about racism in our country and when we do that, then we can truly say that all of God's children did come together," said Pastor Brown.
After the reflection by the Pastors and the Bishop, there was a candle remembrance to honor those ten who lost their lives in the racially-motivated violence of Jefferson Avenue, candles were brought forward to the alter as a Jewish Prayer was recited.
“I have been praying for our city and the thirteen victims and families affected by last Saturday’s horrific shooting from the moment I learned of this tragedy. Our community is reeling from this act of racially-motivated violence borne of the scourge of white supremacy,” said Bishop Fisher. “Losing one precious life is too many, but the ten souls lost, and three others injured call us to pause, reflect and cry out to God in our need.”