The Billy Graham Rapid Response Team (BG-RRT) has deployed to Monterey Park, California, after a mass shooting. Police say a gunman opened fire at a ballroom dance studio on Saturday night, killing 11 people and injuring 10 others. The shooting, one of California’s worst in recent memory, happened during Lunar New Year celebrations.
“What an incredibly frightening situation. There are no words to lessen the pain of those families who are grieving right now,” said Josh Holland, international director of the BG-RRT. “We are sending our crisis-trained chaplains to help. We want to be able to comfort people, listen and grieve with them, pray with them and share God’s love with those who have been impacted by this horrific tragedy.”
The team of crisis-trained chaplains, including some chaplains who speak Mandarin, will help meet the emotional and spiritual needs of those impacted by this shooting.
BG-RRT chaplains are now providing emotional and spiritual support in seven locations. Besides Monterey Park, California, chaplains are also deployed five hours to the north in Merced County, California, helping people after massive flooding in the area. Chaplains are ministering to people in tornado-ravaged Selma, Alabama, and Griffin, Georgia. Chaplains are also serving in two areas of Florida after Hurricane Ian battered the southwest coast of the state in September 2022. In addition, chaplains are offering hope and providing emotional comfort and spiritual care to families who have been forced to flee their homes in war-torn Ukraine.
For more information on the ministry, including videos, photos, news articles and an interactive map of former and current deployments, visit the BG-RRT press kit or BillyGraham.org/RRT. Updates can also be found at Facebook.com/RRTChaplains.
About the Billy Graham Rapid Response Team:
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The Billy Graham Rapid Response Team was developed by Franklin Graham and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association following the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. It has since grown into an international network of chaplains in the U.S., U.K., Canada and Australia who are specifically trained to deal with crisis situations. They have deployed to more than 680 disaster sites across the globe, including shootings, floods, hurricanes, wildfires and tornadoes.
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Media Contact:
Christine Batchelder
cbatchelder@bgea.org