GLENSIDE, Pa. – Congresswoman Madeleine Dean (PA-04) released the following statement on the horrific shooting at Annunciation Catholic School in Minnesota, in which two children were murdered and 17 others, mainly children, were wounded:
"I am sick with grief for Annunciation Catholic School.
Two children murdered at Mass. More than a dozen children wounded. A church-full of others and their families forever traumatized.
Innocents met with terror and gunfire, hit with bullets as they prayed. An act of pure evil.
In this country, we have grown too accustomed to offering thoughts and prayers.
Columbine. Virginia Tech. West Nickel Mines School. Sandy Hook. Parkland. Uvalde. An unending list of unspeakable tragedies.
Thoughts and prayers didn’t prevent at least two children — 8 and 10 years old — from being murdered in their pews today. They didn’t save the lives of worshipers at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, or Mother Emmanuel AME in Charleston.
It takes action.
When will we do something — anything — to lead our children and our country out of these preventable horrors?
As we learn more, I beg of all lawmakers to have the courage to ask how we can prevent gun violence — because we can. Let us announce real action.
I’m grateful for law enforcement, first responders, and hospital staff. Yet I am utterly heartbroken for the entire Minnesota community, those wounded and forever scarred by unspeakable trauma.
There really are no adequate words.
May God bless the families of Annunciation; and may we understand that the children of Annunciation are not just God’s children, they are our own."
Rep. Madeleine Dean is a mother, grandmother, attorney, professor, former four-term member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, and U.S. Representative for the Fourth District of Pennsylvania.
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