As more information comes out about the Uvalde, Texas school shooting on May 24, locals took time to grieve and pray for the families of Robb Elementary School.
About 40 people attended a candlelight service of “Lament and Hope for the victims” on May 24 in St. Luke’s Episcopal Church.
Rev. ClayOla Gitane, the church’s rector, said she felt a need to offer an opportunity for locals to grieve, so she helped organize a bell ringing ceremony on May 25, the placement of a memorial on May 26, and an ecumenical candlelight vigil last Friday night.
The church also hosted its own service on Thursday night.
“I felt it was important to do,” Gitane said of the events.
“This church is a voice of the community. I wanted to coalesce our lament.”
National outlets report 21 victims in the shooting including 19 students and two students and another 17 injured.
During Sequim’s interfaith service, participants sang, prayed, held candles and listened as pastor Russ Britton of Dungeness Valley Lutheran Church read each victims’ name, and Gitane rang a hand bell after each name.
Mother-daughter Vanessa and Eden, 11, Schubert attended the service together seeking a place to grieve.
“When Sandy Hook happened, (Eden) was just 2 or 3, and I just thought there’d be no way something like that would happen,” Vanessa Schubert said. “And then Parkland happened and we marched in the streets … Uvalde really affected me too.”My daughter is near that age (of the student victims), and I work in Sequim School District … I don’t want it to be political. I just want to show my grief.”
She hopes there’s a local event for March For Our Lives on June 11.
“I can’t not do anything,” Schubert said. “I want people to know I’m not OK with this.”
Earlier in the week, Gitane and St. Luke’s Liturgy Planning Team agreed to stop its usual Winchester chime and hymn at noon on May 25 and replace it with a peal, a bell ring, for each victim in the shooting.
Participants of its Soup’s On free lunch on Wednesdays program stood for the three-plus minutes in silence to honor the fallen, Gitane said.
Gitane, a Fort Worth, Texas native, said her job as a priest is to lead people in their lament and ask difficult questions.
“We have to ask ourselves hard questions and act,” she said.
Last Thursday, Gitane made signs with each victim’s name, splattered them in red ink, and laminated them to place in front of the church’s sign. She said placing the ink was emotional and difficult.
Attendees of the Friday night service and church members wrote prayers on cloth and attached them to the church’s fence. The interfaith service was sponsored by St. Luke’s, Dungeness Valley Lutheran Church and Trinity United Methodist Church.
Sequim Gazette photos by Matthew Nash Pastor Russ Britton with Dungeness Valley Lutheran Church plays guitar and sings during a candlelight service on May 27 inside St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Sequim for the victims of the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
During a special service on May 27. Rev. ClayOla Gitane with St. Luke’s Episcopal Church rings a bell after each name is read of a victim in the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
Sequim Gazette photo by Matthew Nash/ Rev. ClayOla Gitane, rector at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, spreads ink to symbolize the blood of two victims at the Uvalde, Texas school shooting. She displayed signs for the victims in front of the church.
Rev. ClayOla Gitane, rector at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, places signs and bears to remember the victims of the May 24 shooting in Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas. More signs were being made inside and later placed to honor the victims.
