Church bells are tolling across the U.S. this morning in remembrance
of the victims of the Newtown, Conn., school shooting last Friday, with
religious leaders calling on people to pause and reflect on the tragedy.
"Bells
in churches historically have a variety of functions. They are
announcements, they are a call to prayer, they are a memorial and they
are a call to action," the Rev. Richard Burnett, rector at Trinity
Episcopal Church Downtown in Columbus, Ohio, told
The Columbus Dispatch.
"I think all of those things at one level or another can speak to
people in our community a week after the tragedy of the massacre."
When 20-year-old gunman Adam Lanza walked into Sandy Hook Elementary
School in Newtown last Friday morning, he had already killed his mother,
Nancy Lanza, at their nearby home. He then proceeded to shoot down 20
children, the school's principal an five other employees before turning
the gun on himself, in the deadliest school shooting America has
experienced since the 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech.
"We are
standing in solidarity with those who weep and grieve," the Rev.
Virginia Lohmann Bauman of St. John's Evangelical Protestant Church
added. "Our bells also ring because the resurrection is real for us and
death is not the end. We do believe in eternal life, and these children
are in heaven with God and with Jesus."
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