Ten years ago in Charleston, South Carolina, a white supremacist gunned down nine people at a Bible study inside Mother Emanuel AME Church, the oldest Black church in the South.
The church’s pastor, Clementa Pinckney, was one of the people killed in the massacre. His daughter, Eliana Pinckney, graduated from Philadelphia’s Temple University in May.
“It gets a little easy to forget sometimes that I’m 21 and that my dad died when I was 11,” she told CBS News.
Then-President Barack Obama delivered Pinckney’s father’s eulogy.
“I can distinctly remember at 11, knowing the magnitude President Obama held,” she said.
Two days later, at the shooter, Dylan Roof’s, bond hearing, some family members of his victims publicly expressed forgiveness.
Felicia Sanders survived the shooting by playing dead, shielding her granddaughter underneath her. But her son, Tywanza Sanders, was gunned down.
“By the time I hollered for everybody to get down, the first couple people had already been shot,” Sanders told CBS News. “…I saw my son got hit. My son died on one side of me and…my aunt died on the other side. He took the bullets that we ultimately was supposed to have.”
“May God have mercy on you,” Sanders told Roof in court back in 2015.
“I raised up, knowing that Jesus forgave us,” Sanders told CBS News of her decision to say that in court. “Forgiveness wasn’t for him. It was for me.”
Myra Thompson, who led the Bible study, was among those killed. Her husband, Rev. Anthony Thompson, told CBS News he did not initially intend to speak at that court hearing.
“I forgive you and my family forgives you,” Thompson said in the courtroom in 2015.
“What I want people to understand is this was a divine intervention,” Thompson told CBS News. “OK, God called me to forgive this guy. That’s when I began to heal. And then, within a few minutes, I’m light as a feather. He gave me a peace, and that’s what that forgiveness did.”
Said Pinckney: “I think forgiveness is a really hard thing and a hard concept. Instead of having a sense of hatred or animosity towards him, I honestly wish for growth for him and anyone surrounded by him. I think that hatred is such a powerful disease that unfortunately, seems to dictate the way our country is run.”
Four years ago, Pinckney told CBS News as she was graduating from high school that she wanted to put more good into the world. Today, she’s a professional actress. At Philadelphia’s Arden Theatre, she’s part of the ensemble in its production of “Rent.”
“I’m really passionate about doing art that means things to people,” she said. “That isn’t the reason they came to the theater, but it’s the thing they leave the theater thinking about.”
With her social justice mindset, Pinckney hears her father’s voice. She’s giving life lessons in resilience and forgiveness, both on and off the stage.
“The fact that I still have a family that I can call and check in on … is such a blessing,” she said.
Mark Strassmann is CBS News’ senior national correspondent based in Atlanta. He covers a wide range of stories, including space exploration. Strassmann is also the senior national correspondent for “Face the Nation.”
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