KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – East Tennessee church leaders are filling sanctuaries, learning to protect their flocks from armed intruders after shootings targeting Tennessee and Texas congregations.
Houses of worship without security plans “are in denial,” said Blount County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Josh Blair.
“We have got to get rid of the thought that it’s never going to happen in my church,” Blair told 1,100 people at a Nov. 27 “active shooter” seminar for houses of worship he led at East Maryville Baptist Church.
“Do you think in Texas, when they came to church to worship the Lord, they thought someone was going to come in and shoot their church up? I guarantee they didn’t,” Blair said.
It was Nov. 5 when a gunman killed 26 people, including an unborn baby, and wounded 20 more at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. Six weeks earlier, on Sept. 24, a woman died and seven people were injured at Burnette Chapel Church of Christ in Antioch, Tennessee.