By Ben Robinson
Staff Reporter

brobinson@thepccourier.com

Photo courtesy Charleston Post and Courier
Emanuel AME Church shooting suspect Dylann Roof appears via video before a judge during a hearing following his arrest last week.

PICKENS — As the nation reacted to the news of tragedy in Charleston last Wednesday, the devastation hit home especially hard for one Pickens city councilman.

Among the nine dead in the attack at Charleston’s Emanuel AME Church was a man who had for a number of years served the public, both as a preacher and as a government official. Emanuel pastor Clementa Pickney was first elected to the S.C. House in 1997 before seeking a seat in the State Senate in 2001.

Isaiah Scipio has served on Pickens City Council since 2011. He is the son of legendary local pastor Julius Scipio, and has continued his mission since his father’s death of cancer in 2009. Scipio is the pastor of O’Zion Baptist Church in Seneca.

“This has been one of the most horrifying things I’ve ever been able to witness in my lifetime,” he said. “This has touched me greater than any event that I have experienced.”

Scipio said the young man who fired the fatal shots — identified by police as 21-year-old Dylann Roof of Lexington — was an unwitting participant in “spiritual warfare.”

“But I don’t think the lives of those people in that church were lost in vain,” Scipio said. “I think this incident may be the first step in religions being more understanding of each other.”

Scipio said he has already spoken with members of his church about better security.

“We’re going to do whatever it takes so that somebody feels safe coming our way to worship the Lord,” he said.

Scipio was distraught about the events of last Wednesday night.

“It was so horrific, so senseless,” Scipio said. “You hate to get to the point to where you don’t trust people assembling to worship God.”