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A pastoral response to\\xa0the killing of Alton Sterling, a black man shot several times while being held on the ground by police outside a Louisiana convenience store, Philando Castile, a young black school nutrition services worker who was shot by a police officer during a stop for a minor violation. Also, there was the sniper attack resulting in the death of Dallas Police officers Patrick Zamarripa, Brent Thompson, Michael Krol, Michael Smith, and Lorne Ahrens, killed in the line of duty, as well as 7 officers and 2 civilians who were injured during the shooting.

What made these events this week so troubling is that we were brought to the scene of the crime so vividly through cell phone video accounts. They are shockingly real to us. We\\u2019ve heard the gunshots, we\\u2019ve heard to cries, we\\u2019ve entered to chaos, and we feel the devastating grief.

I was reading the news Saturday morning and read a headline asking, \\u201cWho Can Heal Us?\\u201d I believe this sums up our ache as a country. We need healing. We are broken.

I want to offer a humble pastoral perspective and challenge all of to allow the Holy Spirit to speak to us and teach us. I feel a particular pastoral weight in this challenge. While we all agree in our disgust at the events of the week, these senseless shootings, we have differing narratives that they fit into.