​When the violence erupted near FSU’s student union, students fled across the street towards the Co-Cathedral of St. Thomas More. Many sought safety in our Catholic student center and remained there in lockdown throughout the incident. Our team immediately responded with hospitality, prayer, and care. Catholic Noles led rosaries, offered food and water, and accompanied fellow students as law enforcement cleared the campus.

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As Sam Nunnally, Catholic Noles’ Director of Campus Ministry shared with Catholic News Agency, “It brings me great joy, even in the midst of sorrow, to see our Catholic students living out their faith real-time in the midst of such a dire situation.”

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In the moments and days that followed, the Church has remained a place of refuge and healing. Our Holy Thursday Mass was packed — a moving liturgy made even more powerful by Fr. Luke’s homily, which invited us to bring this grief to the foot of the cross, with the hope of the resurrection to come.  As a team, the clergy of the Co-Cathedral of St. Thomas More, the TOR Sisters, FOCUS Missionaries, staff, as well as a network of Catholic mental health providers that Catholic Noles recently solidified, have been providing support as students process the event and manage responsibilities as the semester reaches its close.