Saint Paul Seminary community, leaders offer prayers, guidance after tragedy
Fr. Dennis Zehren, pastor at Annunciation Catholic Church and School in Minneapolis, was ordained in 2004 after attending The Saint Paul Seminary.
Nothing could have prepared him, though, for what would unfold at Annunciation the morning of Aug. 27, 2025. Zehren was celebrating the first Mass of the school year when a shooter opened fire through the Church’s stained-glass windows, killing two students and injuring 18 people, most of them children.
“My good people of Annunciation, the people of Minneapolis, all of our neighbors, we are in a very low place; it’s a place we could have never imagined, even in our worst nightmares,” Zehren said in his homily Sunday at Annunciation, shared by the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. “We’ll never be able to get back to the same place, but what we do is we begin again. We begin anew.”
Seminary Catechetical Institute founder Jeff Cavins grew up going to Annunciation during elementary school. Zehren was his pastor at St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Church in Brooklyn Park until July. One of the teachers who was in the church Aug. 27 is a close family friend and taught one of Cavins’ daughters.
“When evil impacts our lives, explanations seem distant, hollow and even impersonal,” Cavins said in a video reflection posted by Hallow. “But encapsulated in all that went on at Annunciation is a snapshot of the reality we live in during these days. … When we examine our lives, we can identify experiences that seem to contradict God’s promise. But as people of faith, we live in hope regarding our future.
“Our community will move forward in hope. Faithfulness expressed in love is what will win the day and bring about the good.”
Archbishop Bernard Hebda and Saint Paul Seminary alumni Bishop Michael Izen and Bishop Kevin Kenney have led the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis through the tragedy. At the seminary’s year-opening “Gaudeamus” (“Let Us Rejoice”) Mass on Wednesday, Sept. 3, Hebda shared the story of a girl who survived the shooting after taking a bullet to the head.
“We’ll never be able to get back to the same place, but what we do is we begin again. We begin anew.” — Fr. Dennis Zehren, Annunciation pastor and Saint Paul Seminary alumnus
As she rode in an ambulance to the ER, she and another wounded schoolmate “held hands and prayed the Our Father,” said Hebda, who planned to lead a live-streamed rosary at 10 a.m. Friday for those affected by the shooting and for an end to violence against children. “It was so natural for her to come to our loving God as a child and to see our God as a father even in the moment of such disturbance, of such trouble. My sisters and brothers … we never want to lose that childlike faith that comes from our encounter with the Holy Spirit.”
Support, both in prayers and financial generosity, has poured into the Twin Cities from all over the world. Pope Leo XIV offered his prayers for the Annunciation community, and Vice President J.D. Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance visited the Church on Wednesday to pay their respects.
“We live in a fallen world, and we can’t always explain why such unspeakable suffering is allowed to take place, especially in the Lord’s house during a liturgy, our highest form of worship this side of eternity,” Saint Paul Seminary Rector Fr. Joseph Taphorn said. “But we do know that our Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers, and that He will always bring about the ultimate good no matter how evil the situation.”
Zehren echoed that sentiment in his homily.
“It reminds us, when death and darkness have done their worst, that’s when God says, ‘Now just watch to see what I will do,’” Zehren said. “There is no darkness that God can’t bring light from. There’s no sorrow that God can’t spring joy from. There’s no grieving that Jesus can’t bring comfort to, and there’s no dying that Jesus can’t raise to new life.”
Those wishing to support the Annunciation community may do so via the Annunciation Hope and Healing Fund set up by the Catholic Community Foundation of Minnesota.