Easter offers hope for Michigan pastors battling gun violence with buybacks, rallies

Hanging on a wall inside the office of a Southfield church is a sculpture that reads "Peace" made out of the parts of what was once a gun.

On a table in front, the Very Rev. Chris Yaw of St. David's Episcopal Church laid out on Good Friday some other pieces of art he recently collected, made from guns collected at buybacks: a cross made of barrels, a necklace fashioned from pieces of a gun grip, and a small plowshare crafted from gun pieces symbolizing the Bible verse about turning swords into plowshares.

The art is one way that Yaw has been working to combat gun violence over the past couple of years since the Oxford High School and Michigan State University shootings brought renewed attention to the problem. His church has already held two buyback sessions that collected about 350 guns from local residents in exchange for gift certificates at stores. Yaw, the church's rector for 16 years, recalls the 2-mile-long line of cars outside his church on 12 Mile Road eager to dispose of their guns. As he and others celebrate Easter, the holiday's message brings hope for their plans to help reduce gun violence in Michigan.

"Jesus was very clear in saying that we need to love our neighbor and we need to care for our neighbor," Yaw, 61, said. "This is our theological foundation here: We really feel that it's the job of the church to be involved in the world, to really help bring about God's kingdom. ... And when you have people who are in your neighborhood that are up late worried because they have a gun, they don't know what to do with it ... this is the job of the church, to help bring that shalom, that peace, to the Earth and make the world what it ought to be."

'A message of hope'

Earlier this month, Michigan State Police announced it would make sure all guns it receives for disposal would be completely destroyed, a change brought about in part because of Yaw's efforts and a New York Times report. Yaw is planning another buyback in June and a number of other churches across Michigan are planning an effort that month to combat gun violence called Silence the Violence, led by the Church of the Messiah in Detroit. Members of Gesu Catholic Church in Detroit on Friday held their ninth annual march against gun violence and a forum featuring survivors of shootings.

This Easter, faith groups are celebrating new gun safety laws that went into effect last month that some of them, such as the Michigan Conference of The United Methodist Church, had been lobbying legislators to pass.

"The message of Easter is a message of hope," Yaw said. "The message of Easter is one of God's kingdom reigning and of good triumphing evil and we believe that God loves his world, and God wants God's people to bring about that kingdom of hope and love and joy and harmony to this world. Easter is the ultimate statement that evil doesn't win."

In addition to practical programs such as gun buybacks, church members say faith can change minds, and can lead people to peace instead of reaching for guns.

"This is Holy Week. This is Resurrection Sunday. We are to be telling the whole world about Jesus," said Paulette Golston, of Detroit, sitting in her minivan while visiting Yaw's church on Friday. "And that would help the gun violence. The heart has to change."

Golston was one of several people who took part in St. David's Episcopal Church's drive-through service for Good Friday prayers. She had noticed a sign a block away that read "Drive Thru Good Friday Prayer and Crosses 1/2 Mile Ahead" and decided to check it out. Church members gave away necklaces with olive wood crosses from Jerusalem to drivers who pulled into the parking lot and recited to them a Good Friday prayer. They handed out cards that read "we pray this card will help draw you closer to Jesus," inviting them for Easter Sunday services.

A call to action

In the months after the Oxford school shooting in November 2021, Yaw felt compelled to take action on gun violence. He contacted the Oakland County Sheriff's Department and local police departments to gather information on gun-related deaths, filing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. He found out there were 123 Oakland County deaths involving guns in 2022, about 80% of them by suicide. He then created a makeshift symbolic graveyard on the back lawn of his church with tombstones for every person in the county who died of gunfire, reported the Episcopal News Service. The symbolic tombstones were of different colors representing whether they were adults, children or suicide victims.

Yaw then met with Oakland County commissioners and police chiefs to talk about gun buyback programs. Various police departments organized buybacks at their stations, but Yaw suggested one take place at his church. The county was able to help with funding for police overtime to staff the event, and others donated money for gift cards for people giving up their guns.

"We had $5,000 in gift cards and we went through those in 20 minutes," Yaw said of his first gun buyback held in October 2022. "We had a 2-mile-long line of people wanting to give us their weapons."

The church got about 100 guns and held another one the following year in December 2023 that brought in more than 220 guns. He said he was surprised at how many people were eager to get rid of their guns, but that police were unable to thoroughly dispose of them. The guns were taken by Southfield Police and the plan was to eventually send them to Michigan State Police, which contracts with a group based in Missouri, GunBusters. Other police agencies and groups in cities like Flint and Lansing had similar processes. Yaw assumed the guns would be totally destroyed by GunsBusters, but he later learned from a New York Times report that parts of the guns were preserved to be later sold.

Yaw was outraged, since he and others were led to believe the guns would be totally destroyed. On March 12, Michigan State Police said in a statement it would make sure the guns were completely pulverized by using a scrap metal processing facility in Jackson for disposal of firearms.

“This new method will improve public safety by ensuring all parts of a firearm are destroyed, never to be used again, and continue to meet the ATF’s acceptable destruction procedures, as we always have,” said Col. James Grady II, director of Michigan State Police. Last year, state police disposed of 11,582 firearms.

"We were elated to hear that the state police will now completely destroy all ... guns that they get every year from various municipalities," Yaw said.

In 2008, Church of the Messiah, an Episcopal congregation, started its Silence the Violence campaign to remember victims of gun violence after the deaths of a several young people, said Pastor Barry Randolph. Last year, the annual event grew to a statewide series in seven other cities. And this June, organizers plan to expand it further with events planned in Detroit, Flint, Saginaw, Pontiac, Southfield, Lansing, Grand Rapids, Muskegon, Oxford, Ann Arbor, Grand Haven, Traverse City, Niles and Holland. They're still working on details for the events, which will likely include marches, gun buyback programs and leadership training. Churches and other groups can register and offer suggestions for events at endgunviolencemi.org/silence.

Bishop Bonnie Perry, who leads the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan, has been a leading supporter of the efforts over the past couple of years.

"As Christians celebrate Resurrection Sunday, we believe that we can resurrect our communities and even this country to be free of gun violence," Randolph said. "So it's all about bringing hope. ... When it comes to Easter, it's all about coming back from the dead ... and we want to commemorate and remember those who have died and others and let them know that we're standing up in their honor."

Jim Sweeney, a retired teacher who taught construction at Oakland Technical Center in Pontiac, attended the Friday rally at Gesu Catholic church. The annual event started in 2015 after a church member, U.S. District Judge Terrence Berg, was shot outside his Detroit home. The theme of this year's rally was that everyone in society is affected in some way by gun violence. Some of Sweeney's students attended Oxford High and would sometimes commute to Pontiac for his classes; a few were in his classroom in Pontiac at the time of the shooting in Oxford.

"We're advocating peaceful solutions," Sweeney said. "Easter week certainly should end with the hope of resurrection. It's easy to get discouraged. When you turn around, there's another shooting and you think 'well, what am I really doing to solve the problem,' but I think there's a hope out there."

Contact Niraj Warikoo: nwarikoo@freepress.com or X @nwarikoo.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan pastors use gun buybacks to help reduce gun violence