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\n At Sunday morning church services around the country, conservative religious leaders found the same word to describe Charlie Kirk<\/a>, the podcaster and political activist killed on Wednesday: martyr.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cToday, we celebrate the life of Charlie Kirk, a 31-year-old God-fearing Christian man, a husband, father of two, a patriot, a civil rights activist, and now a Christian martyr,\u201d said Rob McCoy, the pastor emeritus of Godspeak Calvary Chapel in California.\n <\/p>\n \n Kirk, a prominent ally of President Donald Trump who attracted an ardent conservative following and criticism for his anti-feminist, anti-immigration views, was fatally shot<\/a> Wednesday at Utah Valley University. He was speaking to a crowd of thousands<\/a> as part of \u201cThe American Comeback Tour,\u201d which featured Kirk\u2019s signature event: debating college students about culture war topics.\n <\/p>\n \n Several evangelical megachurches<\/a> \u2013 which Kirk often visited on weekends to pitch his vision of conservative politics \u2013 dedicated their Sunday services to the assassinated political commentator, complete with video compilations of the viral moments<\/a> that helped propel Kirk to fame. Pastors mourned Kirk both as a friend who built close personal relationships with evangelical leaders and a bombastic advocate for conservative Christian causes, who openly mixed politics with religion.\n <\/p>\n \n And although authorities haven\u2019t announced a motive in Kirk\u2019s shooting<\/a> and he was speaking at a secular university when he was shot, several religious leaders framed his killing as an attack on the Christian church.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cThe attack on Charlie Kirk was much deeper than a political attack on the First Amendment,\u201d said Jackson Lahmeyer, the pastor of Sheridan Church in Oklahoma and the founder of \u201cPastors for Trump,\u201d a group of pastors who lobbied for Trump\u2019s reelection, at his Sunday morning service. Some 5,631 people attended his 10 a.m. sermon, including both online and in person, he told CNN.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cThe attack on Charlie was spiritual in nature and an attack on the very institution of the church,\u201d Lahmeyer said.\n <\/p>\n \n Pastors echoed Trump, who called Kirk<\/a> a \u201cmartyr for truth and freedom\u201d in an address Wednesday evening from the Oval Office and blamed \u201cradical left political violence.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Several conservative pastors compared Kirk to the biblical figure Stephen, who was stoned to death and is regarded as the first Christian martyr of the New Testament.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cMake no mistake, this was not random,\u201d said McCoy, who called himself Kirk\u2019s \u201cfriend and his biggest fan,\u201d and said Kirk called him his pastor. \u201cWe are in a spiritual battle. The same murderous spirit that raged against the prophets, that crucified Christ and that martyred Stephen is raging again in our day.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n The death of Kirk \u2013 who often disparaged racial and religious minorities and the LGBTQ+ community \u2013 hasn\u2019t been mourned by everyone. Social media posts expressing apathy or making jokes about Kirk\u2019s death have led to users being targeted by an anonymous doxxing website<\/a> and have even led some employees to be fired<\/a>. And several Black pastors rejected the celebration of Kirk\u2019s legacy during their Sunday sermons.\n <\/p>\n \n But his killing has propelled interest in Turning Point USA Faith<\/a>, the religious arm of Kirk\u2019s right-wing youth organization, according to McCoy. He said the number of Turning Point USA Faith\u2019s partner churches has doubled in the days since Kirk\u2019s death.\n <\/p>\n \n Sunday\u2019s sermons reflected the intimate relationships Kirk built with Christian leaders, many of whom are also public advocates for Trump. White evangelicals served as a crucial voter base<\/a> for Trump during both elections he won.\n <\/p>\n \n Lahmeyer told CNN Kirk was a personal friend for years. \u201cObviously we\u2019re mourning because we lost him,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just tough.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n His congregants have responded to the shooting with \u201ca range of emotions,\u201d including anger, he said. It\u2019s \u201chard to believe, hard to process. You don\u2019t think it\u2019s real, but it\u2019s real.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n He told CNN he canceled a previously scheduled guest sermon to deliver a sermon himself Sunday dedicated to Kirk, titled \u201cTurning Point.\u201d He said that he hopes for listeners, the sermon can serve as \u201ca turning point where they become even more devout in following Jesus.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI hope that Charlie\u2019s life would inspire people to live a life worth living,\u201d Lahmeyer told CNN. \u201cBeyond the political influence that Charlie made, the greater influence that Charlie made was upon the body of Christ.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n McCoy, who says he met Kirk during a conservative event in 2019, also shared personal stories about their relationship. \u201cI miss my friend,\u201d he said. Godspeak Calvary was the first church at which Kirk ever spoke, he said.\n <\/p>\n \n The two had recently traveled to Seoul, South Korea<\/a>, where they met with Mina Kim, a conservative activist.\n <\/p>\n \n Kirk\u2019s \u201clife was scheduled in 15-minute increments, and everybody wanted a piece of him,\u201d McCoy said. \u201cI was so grateful to have that moment with him in Korea, hear his heart.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n At Grace Church in St. Louis, lead pastor Wes Martin characterized Kirk as \u201cone of the most humble, kind, generous and respectful young men that I had ever interacted with at the time.\u201d He described how the pair built a friendship in 2022 and said Kirk would text him Bible verses during hard times.\n <\/p>\n \n Justin Sparks, the men\u2019s ministry director at Grace Church, said of Kirk, \u201cWhen he was assassinated, I felt like I lost a member of my own family.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cHe wasn\u2019t just a man that was struck down and died, which is tragic, of course,\u201d Sparks said. \u201cWhat you saw was a righteous man martyred, and Americans haven\u2019t seen that before. He was martyred because he had an explicit worldview of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and he shared it everywhere he went.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Just hours after Kirk was fatally shot, Dream City Church in Phoenix, which had partnered with Turning Point, addressed his death. Pastor Luke Barnett<\/a> said Kirk \u201cgave his life doing what the preachers of America oughta be doing, speaking the truth from the pulpits.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Like McCoy, Barnett framed the assassination as an attack on Christianity.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe really are in a spiritual war,\u201d Barnett said. \u201cAnd by the way, Charlie Kirk, what killed him today was not his political views. It was his biblical views, his biblical views of truth.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n His comments mirror those of Kirk\u2019s widow, Erika Kirk, who said \u201cthe spiritual warfare is palpable\u201d in her first address<\/a> after her husband\u2019s death. Kirk himself often invoked similar language, calling the 2024 election a spiritual battle.\n <\/p>\n \n Although Kirk started his career as a more secular conservative who highlighted the separation of church and state<\/a>, during the Covid-19 pandemic he jumped to the defense of churches that rebuffed lockdown mandates and became more outwardly religious. In 2021, Kirk launched Turning Point USA Faith in coordination with McCoy, which hosted \u201cFreedom Night in America,\u201d a monthly event series<\/a> of \u201crallies designed to address current cultural and political issues from a conservative perspective.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n In the last few years, Kirk openly advocated for the US as a \u201cChristian state<\/a>\u201d and referenced the \u201cSeven Mountains Mandate<\/a>,\u201d an evangelical ideology calling for the church to dominate seven sectors: family, religion, education, media, arts and entertainment, business and government.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cThere is no separation of church and state,\u201d he said on his podcast<\/a> in 2022. \u201cIt\u2019s a fabrication, it\u2019s a fiction, it\u2019s not in the Constitution. It\u2019s made up by secular humanists.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Lahmeyer said Kirk\u2019s death was evidence of the \u201cpersecution of Christians.\u201d \u201cChristianity is under attack in the United States of America,\u201d he told CNN.\n <\/p>\n \n For Sunday\u2019s service, he chose to read from the Sermon on the Mount, he told CNN, in which Jesus says, \u201cBlessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness\u2019 sake.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Matthew D. Taylor, a senior scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies in Baltimore, told CNN the \u201cprofound and visceral anger\u201d felt after Kirk\u2019s death has been channeled into calls to defend Christianity.\n <\/p>\n \n The evangelical movement<\/a> has a long history of \u201ca sense of embattlement,\u201d despite the fact they have \u201cunrivaled cultural power\u201d compared to other religious groups, Taylor said.\n <\/p>\n \n Although Christians are a majority in the US, many \u201cstill have a sense that culture is against them and that the world is against them and that they are the victims,\u201d Taylor said. Kirk\u2019s killing is \u201cfueling that narrative,\u201d he added.\n <\/p>\n \n Pastors also took the opportunity to rail against common conservative targets, like same-sex marriage and transgender rights<\/a>, which Kirk had openly opposed.\n <\/p>\n \n Speaking on Wednesday, Barnett said in the aftermath of Kirk\u2019s killing, the church would \u201cdouble down and we\u2019re gonna feed more people, we\u2019re gonna see more people saved. We are also gonna call sin what it is.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n He said Kirk\u2019s death would serve as an opportunity for the church to oppose same-sex marriage and \u201cproclaim like never before that there are only two sexes.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n McCoy similarly denounced \u201ctransgender ideology,\u201d which he said \u201cradicalizes people into violence.\u201d He described the alleged shooter as \u201cindoctrinated\u201d and said the attacker \u201cpulled the trigger, but there were others behind him helping warp that mind.\u201d Authorities are investigating whether Robinson\u2019s romantic relationship with his roommate, who is transgender, could be connected to the shooting, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox told CNN. Trans people account for less than 1% of mass shooters over the past decade, according to the non-profit Gun Violence Archive<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n McCoy also called for more pastors to get involved in national politics after Kirk\u2019s killing.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cIf you say, \u2018I don\u2019t do politics \u2018cause politics is dirty,\u2019 you\u2019re a Gnostic and you need to repent,\u201d he said, referring to an early Greco-Roman religious movement. \u201cWe\u2019re gonna demand of our shepherds that they lead these young people into a land where they can own property, build homes, raise families, and enjoy what life is all about.\u201d\n <\/p>\n Peace and hope<\/p>\n \n But religious leaders also emphasized the importance of peace and civil dialogue in the aftermath of the killing.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe have to implement the words of Jesus in the hour that we live in in this nation,\u201d said Lahmeyer during his sermon. \u201cWe must be as wise as serpents. Yet we also have to be as harmless as doves.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Speaking to CNN, he added, \u201cWe do not respond like those who are persecuting us. We don\u2019t persecute.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Speaking at his Sunday sermon, Barnett said, \u201cDo not let this violence divide us further.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n The \u201cenemy wants chaos, fear and retaliation,\u201d he said. \u201cDon\u2019t give it to them. Instead, double down on truth, double down on courage, double down on your faith and on your families.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n McCoy called for his listeners to carry with them the same hope and fearlessness Kirk harbored. \u201cDespair is no hope,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have hope.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Lorenzo Sewell, the nondenominational pastor of Detroit-based 180 Church who delivered a prayer at Trump\u2019s second inauguration, told CNN the church plans to hold a \u201cHoly Ghost\u201d party with \u201cpraise, worship, and prayer\u201d in Kirk\u2019s honor.\n <\/p>\n \n Sewell and Kirk were friends, and Kirk was scheduled to speak at 180 Church Thursday night, Sewell said in a video<\/a> posted after the shooting. Like other faith leaders, Sewell compared Kirk to the biblical Stephen \u2013 and said he hopes Kirk\u2019s death can help bring more people into the church.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWe pray that there would be more that would come to salvation through Charlie Kirk\u2019s death than even in his life,\u201d Sewell said. \u201cMay this tragedy become a testimony, in Jesus\u2019 name.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n While the White evangelical leaders with whom Kirk built relationships used their Sunday sermons to eulogize him and galvanize a fight for conservative causes, several pastors at Black churches pushed back.\n <\/p>\n \n In an emotional sermon<\/a> at Alfred Street Baptist Church in Alexandria, Virginia, the Rev. Howard-John Wesley decried efforts to sanitize Kirk\u2019s legacy.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cCharlie Kirk did not deserve to be assassinated,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I\u2019m overwhelmed seeing the flags of the United States of America at half-staff, calling this nation to honor and venerate a man who was an unapologetic racist and spent all of his life sowing seeds of division and hate into this land.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Kirk vocally opposed the Civil Rights Act<\/a>, the landmark 1964 legislation outlawing discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin, and he called Martin Luther King Jr. \u201cnot a good person\u201d and \u201cawful\u201d at an event in January 2023. He often criticized affirmative action and made inflammatory comments about Black people and other racial minorities, including saying \u201cIn urban America, prowling Blacks go around for fun to go target White people\u201d on his podcast<\/a> in 2023.\n <\/p>\n \n Wesley criticized people with \u201cselective rage\u201d who condemned Kirk\u2019s killing but not the killing of Minnesota state Sen. Melissa Hortman<\/a> and her husband, Democrats who were shot dead in their home in June, as well as those who \u201ctell me I oughta have compassion for the death of a man who had no respect for my own life.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cYou do not become a hero in your death when you are a weapon of the enemy in your life,\u201d Wesley said to raucous applause.\n <\/p>\n \n Jamal Bryant<\/a>, the senior pastor of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Stonecrest, Georgia, similarly said<\/a>, \u201ceven in a tragic death, you cannot rewrite somebody\u2019s life.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI am all the more concerned about how America and the media is trying to remix a life of racism and white supremacy that went forth unchecked,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n \n He specifically called out other faith leaders who celebrate Kirk, saying, \u201cMy heart is mourning today from pastors and churches all over this country, who are going to have moments of silence and celebrate somebody who is trying to take the nation backwards.\u201d\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Facebook Tweet Email Link At Sunday morning church services around the country, conservative religious leaders found the same…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":145759,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[64,63,134,427],"class_list":{"0":"post-145758","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145758\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Rob](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/usatsi-27084576.jpg\")
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