A month after a fatal shooting during Mass at Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis, at least four people were killed and eight others were wounded during a Church service at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grand Blanc, Michigan Sept. 28. The Church is on the far northwest outskirts of Detroit in the Diocese of Lansing.
According to officials, a gunman drove a vehicle through the front of the Church building during a service, started shooting, and then set a fire that consumed the building. It is possible that additional victims are inside the Church, police say. Various reports said that hundreds of people were inside the building for the service.
The gunman, identified as Thomas Jacob Sanford, a 40-year-old Michigan man and ex-Marine, was shot dead by police, according to officials. No motive has yet been identified for his actions.
President Trump, in a post on his platform Truth Social, said he had been briefed on the shooting and that the FBI will be leading an investigation. “This appears to be yet another targeted attack on Christians in the United States of America. ... PRAY for the victims, and their families. THIS EPIDEMIC OF VIOLENCE IN OUR COUNTRY MUST END, IMMEDIATELY!”
Although members of the Church of Latter-day Saints, sometimes called Mormons, call themselves Christians, the Catholic Church teaches that their teachings about Jesus and the Trinity are at odds with Christianity.
The shooting at the chapel, which officials have called a “total loss,” is the latest in an increasing number of violent incidents involving houses of worship. It is the third so far this year, including Annunciation in late August and an attack at Richmond Road Baptist Church in Lexington, Kentucky, in July.
Other notable shootings at houses of worship in recent years include a December 2024 attack in which a 15-year-old killed two and injured six at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisconsin; a 2018 attack at Tree of Life synagogue that killed eleven and wounded six; a 2017 attack at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, that killed 26 and injured many more; and a 2015 attack at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, that killed nine.
