{"id":156,"date":"2017-11-07T16:08:35","date_gmt":"2017-11-07T16:08:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/2017\/11\/07\/20171172gzhcojf7lx9x5tpzpsz1ijgoolbo8\/"},"modified":"2020-09-05T19:51:51","modified_gmt":"2020-09-05T19:51:51","slug":"20171172gzhcojf7lx9x5tpzpsz1ijgoolbo8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/2017\/11\/07\/20171172gzhcojf7lx9x5tpzpsz1ijgoolbo8\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamden’s response in the wake of the Texas church shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jenelle Cadigan<\/p>\n

It is the fifth deadliest mass shooting in modern United States history, behind Sandy Hook, where 27 were killed, Virginia Tech, 32 killed, Pulse nightclub, 49 killed, and the Harvest Musical Festival in Las Vegas, just over a month ago, where 58 people were killed.<\/span><\/p>\n

This time, <\/span>it happened in a Baptist church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. Twenty-six people are dead and dozens more injured after a shooter opened fire. The victims range in age from 18 months to 77 years old.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s horrific,\u201d the Rev. Douglas House of the Mount Carmel Congregational Church said.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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Reverend Douglas J. House – Mount Carmel Congregational Church<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

The Mount Carmel Congregational Church sits on the corner of Whitney Avenue and Dixwell Avenue, and has been a central part of Hamden\u2019s religious life since colonial times.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPeople go to places of worship for safety, security \u2026 and to focus on how God works in our lives, to ask for forgiveness, to create peace, to create harmony, all the kinds of good things that we value in our society,\u201d House said. \u201cAnd that an individual goes into a place of worship \u2026 and takes advantage of the things that those people are there for, and ends up killing them, it\u2019s beyond words.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

One mile down the road, also on Whitney Avenue, is Our Lady of Mount Carmel, one of seven Catholic churches in Hamden. Father Michael Dolan has been a priest for 20 years and although he has only been with this particular church for five months, he has deep emotional ties to Connecticut.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI was present for the Sandy Hook (shooting),\u201d Dolan said. \u201cI had to go and do the notification to the families of their child, and that was awful.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He recalled the last time he saw one of those families.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThey were in the rose garden with President Obama, and you know the legislation hadn\u2019t gone through,\u201d he said. \u201cThey were so upset.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Dolan wanted some sort of legislation.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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Father Michael Dolan – Our Lady of Mount Carmel Catholic Church<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cPeople do an awful lot of damage in a short amount of time because of the fire power. You wish they would have gun control, but it\u2019s very hard to push through,\u201d he said, attributing that to the fact that people don\u2019t want their rights taken away, but also adding that it doesn\u2019t have to be that way. \u201cYou can have a gun, but do you really have to have a machine gun? It\u2019s amazing. Armor piercing bullets? Really? Is the deer wearing body armor?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Nearly five years later, gun control legislation still hasn\u2019t passed, which Dolan says has led to parishioners wanting to take matters into their own hands.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn my last parish I had two parishioners that would say \u2018You know, Father, I\u2019m packing in case there\u2019s a problem, I\u2019ll take them out,\u2019\u201d Dolan said, adding that he knows that would never end well.<\/span><\/p>\n

He says he doesn\u2019t want to give the impression that the church is a target, but it is one, being a public building and a \u201csymbolically charged space\u201d with a wide-open floor plan. He says he wants the church to be safe, but he admits that it\u2019s difficult to maintain safety when you\u2019re welcoming to anyone. Dolan says parishioners have become hyper-aware during services.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI noticed after the Las Vegas shooting there was a loud noise in church, and I could tell people were like \u2018Is it a shooter?\u2019\u201d Dolan said. \u201cUnited Illuminating was doing construction, and the backhoe hit the sidewalk and they all jumped. You could tell, but I had to keep my composure.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But House says hyper-awareness doesn\u2019t equate to fear.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s human nature. Maybe we\u2019re more aware of our surroundings today than we used to be, but I don\u2019t think people in my congregation and certainly I\u2019m not any more fearful than I ever have been,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

House and Dolan both want the focus to be on the positives during times like these and after events as horrific as this.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt can happen anywhere, but you don\u2019t dwell on that,\u201d House said. \u201cIf you lived your life constantly thinking about terrorism, the terrorists would\u2019ve won, as so many people have said. So you live your life the way you intend to.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Dolan\u2019s face lit up with a smile from ear to ear as he talked about all the engagement rings he has blessed, the beautiful babies he has baptized, and the many first communions he has given. And then, he referenced Holy Scripture.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhere sin is, grace abounds all the more.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jenelle Cadigan It is the fifth deadliest mass shooting in modern United States history, behind Sandy Hook, where 27 were killed, Virginia Tech, 32 killed, Pulse nightclub, 49 killed, and the Harvest Musical Festival in Las Vegas, just over a month ago, where 58 people were killed. This time, it happened in a Baptist … Continue reading Hamden’s response in the wake of the Texas church shooting<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":157,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[107,7,22,110,108,109,105,103,106,104],"class_list":["post-156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hamden","tag-douglas-house","tag-hamden","tag-las-vegas","tag-mass-shooting","tag-michael-dolan","tag-obama","tag-pulse","tag-sandy-hook","tag-texas","tag-virginia-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3217,"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156\/revisions\/3217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hqnn.org\/hqpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}