Southwest Detroit vigil honors lives lost in Texas school shooting

DETROIT (FOX 2) - One day after 19 students and 2 staff members were killed at an elementary school in Texas. people in southwest Detroit gathering to grieve at Santos Church.

"I don’t want to just pray, I want to start with prayer but I want prayer to lead to action," said Joshua Bowers, pastor of Cross and Anchor Church to the assembled crowd. "There are things we can do and there are practical steps we can take and there are things we can do, like vote."

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Rich Colon, the pastor of Santos Church and one of the main organizers of Wednesday night’s vigil spoke about dealing with Tuesday's tragedy.

"The way that I cope with it, the way that I push through it, it all depends on where you put your hope," Colon said. "Our hope - we believe is in a God that is present with us through our struggles and relates in our struggles."

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"What I love to see in this room tonight is the unity among churches, there are several churches represented here and we’ve all come together because we have more in common than we know," Bowers said.

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And while they might not be able to make sense of this latest mass shooting they found some comfort and solace in just being with each other.