At the arraignment, family members trooped into court and, one by one, they stood up and publicly declared that they forgave the young killer, promised to pray for him, and urgently called on him to call on Jesus to repent and seek forgiveness for all his sins. He was apparently unmoved.

Katharine Jefferts Schori, the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal, has no category for what happened in Charleston and how a small group of evangelical Bible believing Blacks handled it. She has no theology to cope with murder of this magnitude; neither do most of her bishops, apart from the salutary notions of "why can't we all just get along together...and please don't do that again."

The Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church has publicly said she does not believe in the unique claims of Jesus Christ as both savior and Lord (she has no Christology). In a video she publicly denied that Jesus is the only way to salvation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IxG96wpx60

In a statement at the 76th General Convention in Anaheim, she stated that personal or individual conversion (to Christ) is a Western heresy and likened it to "work" rather than that of free grace.

In the video, she clarified her views on salvation saying, "In some parts of Christianity we have turned salvation into a work, you have to say that I claim Jesus as my Lord and Savior in order to be saved and that turns it into a work and it denies the possibility of grace."

Really. Tell that to the folk of Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston. What Bible is she reading from? When I first wrote this story about her in 2009, it got nearly 22,000 hits! People couldn't or wouldn't believe it. This is the same woman who was eulogized recently by the idiot Dean of Westminster Abbey who invited her to come and preach.

The retired Bishop of South Carolina, The Rt. Rev. Dr. C. FitzSimons Allison expostulated that Mrs. Jefferts Schori's remarks are not a distortion of Christology, the Trinity or even the Creed, but are the announcement of a different religion. "It doesn't measure up to heresy. She is trying to reduce Christianity to the blank space in the creed between the Virgin Mary and Pontius Pilate."

What these family members did stunned the nation with their power and faith causing even normal belligerents and Nones to step back.

Michael Daly, writing for the Daily Beast, said even the most cynical atheist had to have been in awe as the family members of the murdered faithful rose one after another in the Charleston courtroom and proved the power of their own faith in the face of crushing loss.

"I forgive you," Nadine Collier said through tears to the accused killer of her mother, Ethel Lance. "You took something very precious away from me. I will never get to talk to her ever again. I will never be able to hold her again, but I forgive you, and have mercy on your soul."

She struggled to keep on, "You hurt me. You hurt a lot of people. But God forgives you and I forgive you."

Next came Anthony Thompson, husband of Myra Thompson. He began by addressing the court rather than his wife's accused killer.

"I would just like him to know that, to say the same thing that was just said: I forgive him and my family forgives him. But we would like him to take this opportunity to repent."

The husband then spoke directly to Dylann Roof, who was watching and listening via a video connection from jail.

"That was my sister, and I'd like to thank you on behalf of my family for not allowing hate to win."

"Repent. Confess. Give your life to the one who matters most--Christ. So that He can change him and change your ways."

Thompson's wife had not yet been buried and he was actually offering Roof a way to salvation!

"So no matter what happens to you, you'll be okay."

The next to speak was Felicia Sanders, mother of Tywanza Sanders.

"We welcomed you Wednesday night in our Bible study with welcome arms," she said to the killer.

And so it went. There was no talk of "pluriform truths" much ballyhooed by Frank Griswold, no "your truth and my truth" wrestling for center stage.

The irony should not be missed. Roof reportedly told police that the group was so welcoming and manifestly decent that he nearly decided to abandon his murderous plan.

And here's another pointer to all this. Roof was from a broken family. He was born of a fleeting reunion between his parents three years after their divorce and he never got beyond the ninth grade in high school, according to Daly.

Roof is one of several million young men growing up in America without a father or mother or both and that is the source of the spate of killings of lonely white males. Most of the young white killers of recent vintage have come from broken homes and we are all paying the price.

No one knows when another young, lonely, mentally unstable white male with access to guns is going to visit another church, another shopping mall, another cinema, another school and in a hail of bullets from an easily purchased semi-automatic weapon mow down another dozen or so people.

I wrote recently that China will not allow its citizens to buy a gun of any kind (for even the purchase of a knife, proof must be shown that you need one). Here's the difference, China has a pollution problem that Westerners are warned about, and the Chinese warn their citizens when traveling to America that this country has an out of control gun problem. The difference is that the Chinese are fixing their pollution problem, but America won't touch the issue for fear of the wrath of the NRA and their bullies.

Apparently Roof stayed for an hour and heard what these devout evangelicals had to say in their Bible study and they put to lie the racism that festered in his soul. For one brief moment, the faith that filled their lives could have filled his, but hate and rage took over.

He pulled out an automatic .45 Glock purchased locally by money from his father. As he was about to shoot, he heard Tywanza Sanders say, "You don't have to do this."

Roof is said to have replied that he was a champion of the white race about to start a race war.

"I have to do it," he reportedly cried out.

His next words were the language of white supremacists.

"You rape our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go."

Sanders could have sought to flee. He instead placed himself between the gun and his aunt. He was killed and now his mother stood in the courtroom, addressing the killer.

"You have killed some of the most beautiful people that I know," she told him. "Every fiber in my body hurts and I'll never be the same. Tywanza Sanders was my son. But Tywanza Sanders was my hero."

She repeated, "Tywanza was my hero."

Yet, instead of cursing Roof, she then said this:

"May God have mercy on you."

Now I ask you what does an atheist or liberal Protestant have to say to that kind of faith. The answer, nothing, nothing at all. Not Bill Maher, not Katharine Jefferts Schori, not Frank Griswold and certainly not Gene Robinson.

Wanda Simmons, granddaughter of Daniel Simmons said to Roof, "Although my grandfather and the other victims died at the hands of hate, this is proof, everyone's plea for your soul, is proof that they lived in love and their legacies will live in love.

"So hate won't win and I just want to thank the court for making sure that hate doesn't win."

Finally, there was Bethane Middleton-Brown, sister of DePayne Middleton Doctor. She said, "That was my sister, and I'd like to thank you on behalf of my family for not allowing hate to win," she said. For me, I'm a work in progress," she said. "And I acknowledge that I am very angry. But one thing that DePayne always enjoined in our family, is she taught me that we are the family that love built.

"We have no room for hating, so we have to forgive. I pray to God for your soul."

In the face of this, Jefferts Schori stands silent. There is no grace to be offered because she does not believe in the necessity for personal salvation or salvation of any kind. Why repent if the only repentance is the extent of your carbon footprint.

One day she and Roof will stand before God (as we all will) and give an account of their lives. Don't be so sure that they both might not be heading in the same direction together when the verdict is announced. There will only be one judge and no jury and no General Convention resolution to vote on.

END