Millennial writer Chris Crawford writes:

Eleven years ago this summer, a troubled white man entered the historic Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C., and opened fire on a group of Black worshippers who had welcomed him into their Bible study. He intended to start a race war.

He failed.

He failed not just because the racial murders horrified a nation, but because many of the victims’ families chose forgiveness over vengeance….

Christian scripture teaches that our response to God’s love and grace should be to offer it to each other. This form of grace is shared and perpetuated by our own actions. There are few sites in modern American history that represent human grace as clearly as Mother Emanuel….

Charleston does not teach us that grace is easy; it teaches us that grace is most necessary when it is most difficult.

There is no one-size-fills-all approach to living a life of grace — especially in our public life. None of us can rush the process of forgiveness. For all the examples like the families of the Mother Emanuel victims, there are those who also need more time to process, heal, and forgive. When harm is being perpetuated, the harm must be stopped, and justice must be served, even as we search for the path of grace.

To build a pluralistic society in which everyone can thrive, we need to have the grace to advocate for people who are different from us, and to defend the rights of all people — regardless of whether they look, vote or think like us.

As we embark on this national journey on the 250th anniversary of America’s founding, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to reference. We can mark the pain and suffering of the past and the present, while allowing room to celebrate our progress and rededicating ourselves to the cause of justice.