Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. / Archdiocese of San Antonio.
Washington, D.C. Newsroom, May 26, 2022 / 13:00 pm (CNA).
Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of San Antonio is offering financial, legal, and counseling services to people affected by the May 24 school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
The services, which became available May 25, are all being offered for free, according to the Archdiocese of San Antonio. Anyone who is in need of these services should go to or contact Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Uvalde.
The Catholic Charities donation page says that “emergency financial assistance” will be provided for “family members who need to travel to Uvalde.” The page says that “all donations will go toward supporting these services.”
Archbishop Gustavo Garcia-Siller of San Antonio told CNA Wednesday that Catholic Charities is also planning to use any fundraising to “provide funds for all the funerals.”
Catholic Charities is accepting donations for its Uvalde Relief fund “to support the many families and individuals affected by this tragedy.” They are also accepting prayer intentions.
In addition, the archdiocese says that a team of priests is available to serve those in need of assistance.
A gunman killed at least 19 children and two adults at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, located about 90 miles west of San Antonio, on Tuesday.
In his message announcing the Catholic Charities initiative, Garcia-Siller said that “There are no words to adequately convey the deep sadness, sorrow, and overwhelming shock of the incomprehensible loss of life of 19 children and two adults.”
“We pray that God comfort and offer compassion to the families of these little ones whose pain is unbearable. They must know that we are with them and for them,” Garcia-Siller said. “May the Lord have mercy on us all.”
Garcia-Siller told CNA that multiple victims were parishioners at Sacred Heart. He also said that many that responded to the shooting are Mass-goers.
The shooting has shaken the country and the world and many have responded with grief and sorrow, including Pope Francis, who said that his heart is “broken for the massacre at the elementary school in Texas.” He added that “I am praying for the children and the adults killed and their families.”
The tragedy comes fewer than two weeks after a gunman killed 10 people and injured three others on May 14 at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, and another shooter killed one person and wounded five others on May 15 at a church in Laguna Woods, California.
The recent shootings have also reignited debates about gun control in the United States, with some U.S. bishops chiming in.
Bishop Daniel Flores of Brownsville tweeted May 25, “Don’t tell me that guns aren’t the problem, people are. I’m sick of hearing it. The darkness first takes our children who then kill our children, using the guns that are easier to obtain than aspirin. We sacralize death’s instruments and then are surprised that death uses them.”
The spokesperson for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Chieko Noguchi, said in a statement the day of the shooting that “There have been too many school shootings, too much killing of the innocent. Our Catholic faith calls us to pray for those who have died and to bind the wounds of others, and we join our prayers along with the community in Uvalde and Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller.”
“As we do so, each of us also needs to search our souls for ways that we can do more to understand this epidemic of evil and violence,” she said, “and implore our elected officials to help us take action.”