Devin Kelley, an atheist and Air Force reject, a man who had been court-martialed and dishonorably discharged for assaulting his wife and child, entered the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs, Texas, on Sunday in full combat gear and cut down 26 Christians in cold blood and put another 20 in the hospital. Victims include eight members of one family and the pastor’s own 14-year-old daughter. The fill-in pastor was shot in the back as he made his way up to the pulpit.
Said Wilson County Sheriff Joe D. Tackitt, Jr, “He (Kelley) just walked down the center aisle, turned around and my understanding was shooting on his way back out. It’s unbelievable to see children, men, and women, laying there. Defenseless people.”
While he once had been a Baptist Sunday School teacher, in recent months Kelley had taken to his Facebook page to post atheist screeds, calling believers in God “stupid.”
As he emerged from the church, he was confronted by a brave neighbor, Stephen Willeford, who shot him through a gap in his body armor. He then fled in an SUV, pursued by Willeford and another neighbor. When Kelley finally drove the SUV off the road and came to a stop, he either killed himself or bled out from the wound he’d received from Willeford. The police showed up five to seven minutes later.
This attack represents the worst church shooting in U.S. history, surpassing the nine killed by Dylann Roof at the Emanuel AME Baptist Church in Charleston, South Carolina in 2015.
by Bryan Fischer
