THE minister of Dunblane Cathedral has reached out to the grieving citizens of Newtown, Connecticut.
The Reverend Colin McIntosh, who leads the Church of Scotland congregation in the town near Stirling, said he had left messages of support.
He said the people of Dunblane, where gunman Thomas Hamilton shot dead 15 children and their teacher Gwen Mayor at the local primary school in March 1996, could understand the "numbing incomprehension" that residents would be feeling..
Rev McIntosh's comments came two days after the shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School Connecticut, in the US, which claimed the lives of 26 people, most of them young children.
He said that, like Dunblane, the US town would try to find a balance between memorialising the dead and moving forward but he added that there would be problems for a "long time to come".
Within Dunblane Cathedral there is a permanent sandstone memorial to the children who died in 1996.
Rev McIntosh, who was minister of the cathedral at the time of the massacre, said: "I think we will be hesitating to try to give any advice but there do seem to be similarities between the community in Newtown and our community here in Dunblane.
"So perhaps we can begin to understand what they're going through, and the sheer numbing incomprehension they must all be feeling at the moment.
"There will be big questions and dilemmas for them as there were for us.
"It is a question of how do you strike the balance. The answer, I suspect, will be different for every community but there will be problems for a long time to come."
Rev McIntosh said religious faith could provide support to the families in Newtown as it did for many in Dunblane.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article