Grace Will Lead Us Home: The Charleston Church Massacre and the Hard, Inspiring Journey to Forgiveness
By: Jennifer Berry Hawes / Introduction: Jennifer Berry Hawes / Narrated By: Karen Chilton
Length: 12 hrs and 43 mins
ExTENsive and even-handed reporting on a tragedy made this a MUST Listen
Oh gosh, I dunno what’s worse: This particular mass-shooting, or the fact that it’s just blended into the practically everydayness of mass shootings in America. You tell me.
Well, p’raps I should start off my review of Grace Will Lead Us Home by stating: Lemme tell ya, I actually had a couple of nightmares after listening to this, and I ain’t no shrinking violet. A delicate orchid? Maybe, but once upon a time, I was Queeeen of True Crime. This, however, makes it PLAINLY clear how horrific an event, how exceedingly traumatic it was for the survivors, and for their loved ones (Given photos flashed up during trial).
It starts fairly benignly enough with the day-to-day worship going on at Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal church; things were running late, would the evening’s Bible Study even happen? Yes, it was (Fatefully) decided, but only for 1/2 an hour. But Dylann Roof, one of society’s losers and also supporter of White Supremacist causes, considered that a weekday Bible Study would have fewer people… no Security. Tragically, there are instances of friends, who’d planned on leaving… being asked to stay for the Study… friends who thought: Sure, I will.
First nightmare right there.
Pulitzer Prize winning author Jennifer Berry Hawes then takes us through a looooong and deep look at everyone, and everything, every conceivable angle—covered. It’s a monumental achievement that can conceivably leave the listener staggering, overcome by oh soooo many emotions.
9 individuals out of 12 were slaughtered that day. After?
Two sisters already at odds: One is moved by the Spirit, and she forgives Roof, thus earning herself even more enmity from her estranged sister. And tho’ she can forgive the kid who murdered their mother? This woman will NEVER forgive her sister, but a lack of advance directives leaves the mom’s wishes unknown, thereby sparking even greater outrage.
One man, a minister, throws himself into work after his wife’s death. Finding peace and solace in good works, in further ministering to his flock. Another man, one who spent 8 months out of the year overseas but was MUCH loved by his wife, finds he canNOT get outta his head: I should’ve been there. That S.O.B. would’ve died by my hands; or I could’ve shielded her from bullets with my own body.
And all the survivors? Their loved ones? Completely forgotten by Emmanuel AME’s ministers who steal the limelight after receiving such praise by community members, by Obama’s administration. Where is my God? one woman begs. Only to receive utter silence, only to find solace from the minister of a church nearby, a white minister, a white congregation.
Throughout the trial photos are shown, and Hawes, in brutal color and imagery, describes what the loved ones see (As if it hadn’t been written graphically earlier, during and in the aftermath of the slaughter).
Second nightmare, as I dreamed of blood flowing in streams and rivers, soaking into the carpet, being smeared along the walls and floors, pouring from MULtiple wounds to traumatized bodies.
Karen Chilton is now a favorite narrator, what with my introduction to her being in the awesome Civil Rights Queen just last week. Here, she has just as much material to work with and just as much (Actually, MORE) in the way of emotions to convey. Horror and terror as people begged for their lives, asked why Roof was doing it; and coldness/distance as Roof methodically murdered people of God, as he sat dully behind the Defense’s desk through a fraught trial. Just a magnificent performance that really brought forth every single feeling, all the petty actions, the distress, the forgiveness followed by repercussions, and winding up with the Faith of good people, the sorrow of the ones who became but empty shells.
My only quibble is that then-Governor Nikki Haley comes out looking like The BEST Most Sensitive person EVER, as tho’ her actions prior to the mass shooting, her voting record, were somehow okay (Forget about that particular Alchemy that came about via proximity to Donald Trump, that has worked its particular magic on soooo many who have since forgotten about basic dignity and humanity…). I DID appreciate how whites viewed race relations after the shootings vs. how the Black community viewed them. The Black community saw relations as worse: Yeah, y’all did that Hearts and Flowers Stuff, but how’s the voting going? You might have been visiting our churches for a bit, but have you supported our schools, have you supported our health care, have you given us options? Damning indeed.
Overall, overwhelming. Beautifully beautifully BEAUTIFULLY done, finely-crafted, SUCH in-depth accounts of some truly tremendous people. A grand study of what it means to forgive, of what it means to have Faith, of how to keep on keeping on when, really, you just wanna crawl under a rock and die… or you just wanna tear somebody limb from limb, or you just wanna have a single 5-minutes more with a loved one.
Heartbreaking.
Luminous.
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