“We feel, in the midst of this, that we are called to be peacekeepers — that we are called to pursue the well-being of our communities, and by working with gun violence prevention, we are helping to better our community and our world by being more in alignment with the values and the vision of Jesus,” Shive said.
Since her ordination, Hollas has served as the coordinator of gun violence prevention ministries for Presbyterian Peace Fellowship, a nationwide network of mainline Presbyterians focused on ending violence and war.
Gun violence has only grown worse in that time.
Shane Claiborne, from left, Mike Martin and the Rev. Deanna Hollas at a Guns to Gardens event at Houston Mennonite Church in September 2021 in Houston. The event was scheduled for when the National Rifle Association intended to host an annual meeting in Houston. Photo courtesy Deanna Hollas
The day before the school shooting in Uvalde, the FBI released a report noting an alarming increase in active shooter incidents — a number that has doubled since 2017, climbing from 30 incidents in 2019 to 40 incidents in 2020 and 61 in 2021.
A month prior, the CDC released data showing guns were the No. 1 killer of children and adolescents, claiming the lives of 4,368 Americans under the age of 19 in 2020.
That’s a Uvalde every other day in the U.S., Hollas said.
The minister sees efforts to end gun violence as fulfilling the promises Presbyterians make when they are baptized: “to turn away from violence and toward love, toward life, toward Christ,” she said.
In the wake of the school shooting in Uvalde, Hollas asked Presbyterian Peace Fellowship members to ring their church bells 19 times in memory of the children who were killed.
She shared resources, including Scripture passages and hymns that speak to the issue of gun violence; prayers written by students after the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida; information about related proposals headed to the denomination’s general assembly in June; ways to speak out on social media and to contact elected officials.
People gather May 26, 2022, at a memorial site to pay their respects for the victims killed in the elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
She also urged Presbyterian Church (USA) congregations to host Guns to Gardens events at their churches, inviting — and sometimes incentivizing — gun owners to turn over their weapons to be turned into garden tools. The events are meant to evoke the prophet Isaiah’s biblical vision of peace: “They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.”
