I am a lapsed Roman Catholic. Though still do attend mass a few times a year with my daughter, mainly for the community events.
I can actually remember a few months ago, the priest discussing middle eastern Christians being killed and asking us to join him in praying for them. And hoping that such level of persecution may never find its way into Europe. And I can remember sitting there and thinking just how easy it would be for a terrorist or any other dangerous person to just walk into that church, barricade the door, and do whatever they wanted to do with us parishioners. The volunteers at the church are mostly elderly - two pensioners who stand at the door handing out the hymn sheets on our way in, and opening the door to let people out to their cars etc during and after mass.
There doesn't appear to be any cctv inside the main church. Nor in the car park.
And I have to admit that today's attack has made me very nervous about ever going to mass again. My daughter attends a Catholic school and they go to mass once a month as a school. I am now worried sick about this monthly trip restarting once the schools go back in August. A church with no security and full of school children. What a target that would be.
I know that this is incredibly selfish to think of myself and my daughter in light of this poor man's demise. But i can't help but feel scared that I may be putting my daughter at risk by consenting for her to keep going on these visits with the school. I'm also worried that I'm depriving her of engaging with the community and her friends as the church puts on lots of free family-friendly events throughout the year. I'm now very worried about attending these ever again in future.
Common sense tells me that these attacks can happen anywhere. I live a five minute walk from the church. The school is across the road from it. So it is likely just as risky to be living where I am, or to be sending my daughter to her catholic school each day as it is for her to go to mass. At least the school has a buzzer entry system though. And CCTV.
Anyway, this has just turned into a ramble. I'm seeing lots of priests on Twitter calling Fr Hamel a martyr and saying that his death will strengthen the catholic church, not weaken it. And it just makes me feel incredibly sad. He was an old, frail man.
I worry that this will put a lot of religious people off attending their various places of worship. I worry that the lack of security in places of worship make them easy targets for terrorists.
Anyway. Just needed to get this off my chest. I just wish there was enough money in the UK to to put body scanners everywhere (shopping centres, schools, places of worship, public transport) and more police presence and security guards in these places to perhaps prevent any of the recent German/French attacks from happening here. A very naive wish, i know. But I just feel that nowhere is safe any more. Fr Hamel and the other victims were probably in the place they considered the safest for them.
I wonder if other people feel worried going to their various places of worship? If not before, then how about now after today's tragedy?