Texas church’s art installation remembers lives lost to gun violence
An art installation at St. David’s, Austin, Texas, features nearly 600 T-shirts to represent the average number of people who die from gun violence in the state every 50 days. Photo: Courtesy of St. David’s
[Episcopal News Service] People who have died from gun violence were remembered at St. David’s Episcopal Church in Austin, Texas, through a recently concluded art installation that featured nearly 600 T-shirts, which represents the average number of gun deaths every 50 days in Texas.
The shirts were arranged in rows and then mounted on three large panels made of netting. Those panels were placed on the outside of St. David’s parking garage, adjacent to the church, and displayed Feb. 20 to March 2.
The installation, “Vidas Robadas/Stolen Lives,” was launched by Texas Impact, an interfaith advocacy network, as a way to make visible the reality of gun violence in communities all across the state.
It was created under the direction of Austin artist Alicia Philley and was timed to coincide with Gun Violence Awareness Day at the Texas Capitol, also in Austin, on Feb. 27.
Dianne Hardy-Garcia, the church’s director of community engagement and advocacy, told Episcopal News Service that church members made 250 of the shirts, all of them white, to remember people who died by suicide involving a gun. They were told which families wanted the name, age and birth date or death date to appear on the shirt of their loved one, she said. For others, their shirts simply remember “another life lost” or “otra robada vida.” All include the phone number for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline – 988.
The colorful shirts were made by other churches and represent victims of gun homicide. Since some of them had been displayed elsewhere, St. David’s members made sure to touch up any of the information on them that had faded, Hardy-Garcia said.
The installation was blessed on Feb. 26 by St. David’s assistant rector, the Rev. Kristin Braun, with Philley, the artist, and parishioners who had helped create T-shirts attending.
St. David’s became involved with Vidas Robadas through a recently formed parish advocacy group, Hardy-Garcia said, which had been seeking ways to become involved in issues affecting the state from a perspective of faith. “The question was, how do we as people of faith talk about public policy in a way that comes from a prayerful place?” she said. “Members wanted to be part of this as an offering of public prayer,” she said, as well as a call to action.
Members of St. David’s in Austin, Texas, display T-shirts created to remember people who died by firearm suicide. Photo: Courtesy of St. David’s
Texas Bishop Suffragan Jeff W. Fisher, a member of Bishops United Against Gun Violence, also noted the prayer-based nature of what the church undertook. “On Sundays, many of our churches pray ‘for the victims of hunger, fear, injustice and oppression,’” he said in an email to ENS. “The art installation at St. David’s is a visual form of prayer and a memorial to victims, bringing our attention to common sense gun safety measures.”
Gun violence in the United States killed 48,204 people in 2022, according to the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health. The majority of those – about 56% – were firearm suicides. Gun homicides make up 41%. The remaining 3% includes people who died by accidental gunshots or were killed by law enforcement.
Hardy-Garcia said that as church members created the white T-shirts, they talked about their own experiences with gun violence. “Four people had lost a sibling to gun violence by suicide,” she said, and the chance to talk about it gave them a real sense of support.
Texas also has seen its share of mass shootings, she said, noting the deaths of 19 students and two adults at Robb Elementary Schools in Uvalde in May 2022. And while it’s hard for any gun violence legislation to pass the state Legislature, she said that “praying with their hands and hearts” to create the art installation has inspired some people to explore other actions they might take.
The church isn’t calling for any particular policy to be enacted, she said. “We’re just encouraging people to find ways to be involved.”
When it comes to taking political action, Fisher said that “one definition of ‘being political’ is to publicly care about the way that we regard and treat our neighbors, so that they may not fear violence and oppression.” He added, “Jesus expands our understanding of neighbor, so that we will love all people, with mercy, respect and dignity.”
— Melodie Woerman is an Episcopal News Service freelance reporter based in Kansas.
