BUFFALO, N.Y. — A year later, we still remember.
A governor still remembers.
A mayor still remembers.
“Hatred will not win,” former Buffalo Common Council Member Charley H. Fisher III said. “Violence will not win. We must be too busy to hate.”
The city, joined by Rev. Dr. Jamal Harrison Bryant from New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta, came together at Elim Christian Fellowship for a memorial service to honor the 10 that were lost, but will never be forgotten.
“We’re trying to look solemn and sanctified on this auspicious occasion as if on 5/14 you didn’t want to hurt somebody,” Bryant said. “But it was something in your grandmother’s spirit that composed in me that if I hold my peace and let the Lord fight my battles, victory shall be mine.”
Added New York Attorney General Letitia James: “This community will not be defined by death and tragedy. No, this community will overcome death and tragedy to triumph, and that's why we praise them.”
All walks of faith and life came together — some whom knew them, and others who just didn’t want them to be forgotten.
“This was the shot that rung around the world,” Buffalo resident Dennis Mull said. “And I knew personally one of the persons whose life was senselessly taken. She beat brain cancer only to fall at the hands of a bullet.”
Those bullets changed this city forever. State and city leaders are trying to reclaim their power and called for national gun reform.
“But are they done? No. Not as long as assault weapons intended for the battlefield are still allowed to be sold in this country,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said. “They’re not done. We need another national ban on assault weapons and do it now before anyone else loses their lives in this country.”
But Sunday evening, the community that 18-year-old Payton Gendron attempted to tear apart proved through prayer that he did anything but.
“Love conquers hate, and Buffalo is a powerful reminder of that,” Mayor Byron Brown said.