SUTHERLAND SPRINGS — Demolition began Saturday morning on the original sanctuary of the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs. The work was completed on Monday.
On Saturday, residents drove by with their windows down and watched workers tear down the building where a gunman opened fire on a Sunday service in 2017, killing 26 people.
The demolition capped a bitter dispute between congregants over what to do with the site of Texas' deadliest mass shooting — and the nation’s deadliest mass shooting at a place of worship.
Nearly two years after the shooting, a new church three times as big was built on the same property. The original building was turned into a memorial, painted white with chairs named for each of the victims.
In the small unincorporated town of 600, some of the victims' families considered the memorial to be the only place they could go to grieve their loved ones.
Charlene Uhl lost her 16-year-old daughter Haley Krueger that day. She didn’t want it to be demolished. “It’s important to me because that’s where Haley took her last breath. I would like it to be there but they [the church] have other plans,” she said.
In 2021, a church committee held a vote to decide the original building’s fate. Sixty-six people voted to tear it down while 33 voted to keep it.
A lawsuit filed earlier this year by former church member Amber Holder sought to stop the demolition, alleging that some victims' families who wanted the building to remain as a memorial were not able to have their say.
“So whenever we talked to the church about it, it's like yeah, my membership was thrown out. We heard, ‘My mom doesn't go here anymore because her membership was thrown out.’ I'm like, none of this makes any sense,” Holder said.
The church leadership maintained that some memberships were digitized and that the church sent out reminders for people to check their membership status.
The dispute pitted Holder against the church’s former Pastor Frank Pomeroy and his wife Sherry.
Holder was taken in by the Pomeroys as a teenager in 2005 after fleeing an abusive household, but disagreements over memberships led them to become mostly estranged.
Frank Pomeroy declined TPR's request for an interview. He said in a text message to TPR that he hasn't been with the church for two years.
"I have been gone for two years and do not have a dog in this fight." Pomeroy said. "The way everything has been twisted to an alternative narrative no one I know wants to really speak anymore."
The Pomeroys lost their 14-year-old daughter Annabelle in the shooting.
Survivor John Holcombe lost eight of his family members on that day. In an email to TPR, he said that some have argued it was idolatrous to keep the building, but he disagreed.
“I feel that it is more idolatrous to tear it down and build a memorial. The sanctuary honors the Lord. A memorial honors the people,” Holcombe said.
In a follow-up email to TPR on Wednesday, Holcombe said he was now focused on forgiveness.
“I am not convinced that it is God's will for that sanctuary to be torn down,” he said. “However, I'm at a point where I have to forgive them or I will become bitter and resentful, and that will adversely affect my ministry, my life, and it will adversely affect those around me, such as my step-daughter who I am still raising.”
