An all-faiths prayer vigil at Los Angeles’ First African Methodist Episcopal Church was held Thursday evening in response to the massacre at a black church in South Carolina.
The “city-wide” event was held at 8 p.m. at First A.M.E. in the Adams-Normandie neighborhood at 2270 S. Harvard Blvd., the church announced on its website. Temple Isaiah, a Jewish congregation in Century City, was also part of the event.
“While the facts and other vital information about the incident are still being gathered and discovered, we encourage peace-loving people within and without institutions of faith, to reach out to God and to each other, offering prayer and consolation in wake of this senseless attack against life and liberty,” the church and temple said in a joint statement.
L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti was among those in attendance.
The event was a held response to a shooting that is being investigated at a hate crime in Charleston, South Carolina, in which nine African-American participants in a bible meeting were gunned down.
Suspected gunman, 21-year-old Dylann Roof, told his victims he wanted to kill black people, surviving witnesses told police.
The shooting occurred during a prayer meeting at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, in downtown Charleston’s tourist district. Known as “Mother Emanuel,” it is the oldest A.M.E. church in the South, with the congregation formed in 1816. The house of worship was a meeting place for the local civil rights moment.
The victims ranged in age from 26 to 87 and included the church’s pastor, Rev. Clementa Pinckney, a state senator.
President Barack Obama said Thursday that he knew Pinckney and several members of the church, which he called “a sacred place in the history of Charleston and in the history of America.”
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