Catholic community ministers to Texas shooting victims

Washington, D.C. (CNA) – The local Catholic community is ministering to the victims of the mass shooting at a Texas elementary school. The Archbishop of San Antonio, along with priests in that archdiocese, sprang into action as soon as they learned of the tragedy.

“We’re inviting people just to pray that love will prevail, that the love of God through us will prevail,” Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller told CNA.

Archbishop García-Siller visited the hospital and the civic center in Uvalde, where the families of missing children gathered, on May 24. That evening, he celebrated Mass at the city’s Catholic church, Sacred Heart.

Several of the victims and their families belonged to the Sacred Heart community, he told CNA, including two adults who were killed. Many involved in responding to the shooting attended the Mass: the person who dialed 911 from the school, the person who drove the children to the hospital and a person who was tasked with taking photos of the victims’ bodies.

Their response came after a gunman killed at least 19 children and two adults at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, located about 90 miles west of San Antonio. The incident is reported to be the worst school shooting since the 2012 attack at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, in which the attacker killed 26.

The two adults have been identified as 4th-grade teachers: 46-year-old Irma Garcia, a mother of four, and 44-year-old Eva Mireles, a mother of one. News outlets such as NBC News reported their relatives as saying that the two died while trying to protect their students.

“I was able to meet the husband of one of the teachers who was killed, and the two daughters and son,” Archbishop García-Siller said of Irma Garcia’s family.  

He met with them at the SSGT Willie de Leon Civic Center, as they waited to hear what had happened to the wife and mother. 

The husband of Garcia died reportedly of a heart attack as he was preparing for his wife’s funeral. Joe Garcia, 50,  dropped off flowers at his wife’s memorial on the morning of May 26 the New York Times reported. His nephew said that when he returned home, he collapsed.

Joe and Irma — reportedly high school sweethearts married for 24 years — leave behind four children: 23-year-old Cristian and three teenagers, Jose, Lyliana, and Alysandra.

Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller of San Antonio, who told CNA he met with Joe the day of the shooting, offered his condolences and prayers.

Archbishop García-Siller described the other families at the center as very quiet, with some crying. He called the mood “very somber,” with everyone silently sitting on their own without engaging with one another. 

“So I asked them what we were able to do for them” and what they needed, he said. The only consistent request he received was for prayers and, in particular, “to pray for my child.” 

Archbishop García-Siller described Uvalde as a tight-knit community, including a large Catholic community. He credited Sacred Heart for organizing the May 24 Mass and setting up “the vision for how we can be of use, how we can be of help, to the larger community.”

“We have, already with  deacons, permanent deacons, priests, nuns, lay people, available for prayer, for counseling,” he told CNA, “which was the main thing the families directly affected asked for.”

“It’s a lot of pain,” Archbishop García-Siller described. “It’s just hard to communicate, or articulate the situation.”

Catholic Charities, Archbishop García-Siller added, is providing counseling. And, he added, “We are opening an account to invite people to provide funds for all the funerals” and whatever the victims’ families need, including traveling expenses, lodging, food and legal assistance. 

The archdiocese’s Catholic Charities has opened an Uvalde Relief fund to aid those affected by the shooting.

The Bishop of Piedras Negras, located in Mexico near the border, will also travel to Uvalde. The two cities are connected, Archbishop García-Siller said, since many of the people in Uvalde originally came from that city. 

The archbishop has also engaged teams of prayer, contacting prayer teams in San Antonio — teams that he calls from his office any time he has a need.

He revealed to CNA how he, personally, is dealing with the response. 

“You know that you are tired, but you don’t recognize it because you’re on the move,” he described. “I feel OK. As I said, this is a very community effort and so I don’t feel in any way alone.”

The archbishop told CNA that Catholics and leaders of other religions attended the evening Mass at Sacred Heart. He stressed the importance of the Mass and “to at least to know what we’re doing, why we are doing it, having very clearly the presence of these families before us and knowing that our God will intervene and that God is present.”

Father Jaime Paniagua from Del Rio, Texas, and Father Matthew De León from Sabinal, Texas,  concelebrated the Mass at Sacred Heart. Like Archbishop García-Siller, both Father  Paniagua and Father De León traveled to a hospital in Uvalde and the civic center.

They stayed at the hospital for hours, Father Paniagua said in a video shared by reporter Ashlee Burns of Caller.com and USA Today.

“We talked to the authorities, we talked to the staff, doctors, nurses. And we were able to visit at the ER with some of the wounded, with the families, with the kids,” he said. “In some of the cases, the parents hadn’t arrived yet. So we were there in the ER rooms with the doctor and the kid, and praying with them.” 

“We were present there as well when several families received the news of their kids being deceased,” he added, “being able to pray there for them.”

The victims Father Paniagua met with included a Border Patrol agent grazed by a bullet, a girl with a gunshot wound, and a girl whose face was injured from fragments, the Washington Post reported.

“She was very talkative, describing what happened, step by step,” Father Paniagua said. “When the shooting was happening, she held another girl’s hand, and they were screaming. Their teacher protected them, and they saw the teacher get shot.”

The priest said that he asked each injured child he encountered how they were doing and if they wanted to pray with him. 

“I experienced powerlessness, being there for six hours,” he said. “But God is almighty.”