The news of Charlie Kirk’s assassination has deeply saddened me. I didn’t know Charlie personally, but I followed his work, and I was able to see him speak at the Florida Family Voice gathering four months ago to the day he was tragically murdered. What impressed me most was that the majority of his message was not about politics but on the need for the Church in America to boldly proclaim the whole truth of the Bible. As he worked with young people across our nation, he said they were hungry for uncompromised truth and that churches that watered down the Gospel, thinking that would bring in non-believers, were so wrong. Of course, we at the American Anglican Council could not agree more with him on that. 

What also stood out to me was how much he valued conversation. He wasn’t violent, he wasn’t mean-spirited. He wanted to put ideas on the table, to debate them, to sharpen them in the company of others. That takes courage. It also takes humility—to believe that the truth can withstand challenge, and that even disagreement can be a way of respecting another person’s humanity. 

That’s why this loss feels so deep. Freedom of speech isn’t just a right written in our Constitution—it’s the air that allows ideas to live and breathe. It’s how we learn, how we grow, how we hold one another accountable. When violence takes away a voice, it’s more than tragedy. It’s a silencing that robs all of us of the chance to engage, to answer, to be changed.

His assassination is a tragedy for our nation and the no-doubt many young people he would have influenced to know Jesus over his lifetime. I believe one of the most important things we can do now is pray. 

• For Charlie’s wife, Erika, and their children.
• For our nation’s healing and against any form of violence in response to our rightful freedom of speech.
• For all who are affected by this to know Jesus as Lord and follow his ways as Charlie sought to do.

And let’s pray that we ourselves would have the grace to use our own voices well—to speak truth in love, to listen when others speak, and to honor the God who gave us both our words and our freedom.

In Christ’s Service,

Canon Mark