Practical, lawful steps to protect children, secure the stage, and restore order when organized protesters invade your worship service—like the recent disruption at Cities Church in St. Paul.
You should have full CCTV coverage of all public places in your church. The bad guys know that there will be no CCTV cameras in bathrooms. Security should be on the edges of the room, but in far enough from the door not to be targeted by the invaders on their entry covertly down the center isle. If you live in a stand-your-ground state you are able to force to subdue the invaders and hold them for th police. Anyone filming should be targeted preferentially and every cell phone should be confiscated, and turned over to the police . Anyone assaulting anyone should be dealt with forcefully. A cellular/wifi blocker mighr be useful if they are live streaming. The people are violently invding your houes/property and are not afraid of hurting men, women, or children do not be afraid to return the favor.
1. Every church is different. Our stage is about 150' wide with stairs from the sanctuary floor to the stage on both sides. Having one Safety Team member at the top of those stairs once the stage is cleared or before the protesters breach the stage, armed with some gel pepper spray, could be most beneficial in keeping the stage secure. Using elevation to your advantage, spraying them in the face as they look up, while walking up stairs, would be relatively easy.
2. There are extra mics on our stage for the worship singers. Many churches still use fixed mics for the pastor. Gaining access to a mic would be a great way to project over the shouting and chaos they intentionally create. I happen to sit behind the sound board in our church and they keep a mic there. I may brief the head worship tech that handing a hot mic off to us to make announcements and give direction may be advantageous
3. Using the church PA system, publicly advising, in a firm command voice that the protesters are to leave private property, IMMEDIATELY might be extremely helpful should any litigation arise afterwards. Video recordings would capture that announcement. Further advise them that failure to comply will result in arrest for trespassing. Likely, they won't care. These lunatics live to be arrested.
4. Any protesters blocking exits should be dealt with promptly and forceably. Enlist help from members of the church to have them unblock and allow exit of the sanctuary. There are more of us than of them.
5. We fully expect 10-20% of our congregation to be carrying concealed during any service. Some may inevitably break leather and present a weapon in self defense. Discourage this immediately by loud commands to "STOW YOUR WEAPON" and de-conflict the situation quickly by getting those individuals out of the sanctuary as fast as possible after they stow their weapon. Random shots in a packed sanctuary is a nightmare situation. Those defensive shooters may get shot by other armed churchgoers.
6. Our church is blessed to have a County Sheriff who takes church safety seriously. Our church pays for a Deputy at nearly every service or function. His main task is directing traffic after each service but he is equipped with one of our radios and maintains a listening watch. He can be in our sanctuary within a minute or so of being notified. His call for back-up will generate a much faster response from law enforcement than a 911 call will. Plus, his mobile unit parked out front during service serves as a deterrent.
7. There is an old saying I have found true: We rise to our lowest level of training when things get difficult. Take Keith's advice in coming up with a plan for incidents like these and practice them periodically. These protesters are trying to instill fear while promoting chaos and control over the church goers and staff. They clearly want everything documented on video so they can sue later. Don't give them anything to sue for. Don't hesitate to quickly escalate your response when approaching RED LINES like blocking exits or threatening the kids.
Question: is it a red line when a protester/ invader blocks the aisle and prevents a worshiper from leaving? Something like false imprisonment?
After I warn him or her to get out of my way can I drop him/her? Do I need to try to push him out of the way first, and then drop him? Or what? Thanks so much, keith.
Since a guy from the State Attorney's Office was part of the protest, how is the State not wide open for civil litigation for false imprisonment? I smell money.
Are there any instances of protesters being physically aggressive towards church members? Not verbally; physically. I know they are trained to do everything possible to cause someone else to initiate a physical altercation so they can claim “victim” status. My concern is, that if we use physical force or OC we will be playing right into their hands. They want optics; like the kid crying in the pew in Minneapolis. It shows that we fear them and that they control whatever they want. What if we played their game, and instead of trying to end or evacuate the service we leaned into it and worshipped loud and proud. We can protect childrens areas and the stage without backing down. Just a thought.
Physically blocking access to children and not moving when you try to is unacceptable. I'm not your lawyer, but I have had been in countless incidents like this. You can either dump them (drop them to the ground) to get to the kids or to protect your stage, or you can use OC. Can we agree that blocking access to kids is a red line? I hope so. Pepper spray is very effective. I suggest everyone get training in it AND get sprayed themselves. You will understand how effective it is. Optics wise, we need to put safety of our congregants and our children over optics.
I agree very much with you that there are red lines, and accessing the stage and blocking kids are those lines. However, I think we should be locking the kids down out of protection, and rather than reflexively dismissing for everyone to run and grab kids we resume worship at a volume louder than theirs, and buy time till police get there.
Also, I’ve been trained with and sprayed by OC (FLETC). It had little effect on me. I’ve seen the same in the field. OC is a good tool, but like any tool it’s great when it works but you’d better have a plan if it doesn’t.
I’ve only used the Sabre MK-2 stream cans. That’s what we carried and had used on us when I was in the military. I’m not sure what all brands the LE agencies used that I responded with in the field (I’ve been a firefighter the last 13 years), but I know I’ve been to a few scenes where OC didn’t work on some people, including mass protests. In fact, all it did for those whom it didn’t affect was piss them off more.
I have nothing against OC or its use at all. On most people it works great, but as I mentioned earlier I’ve seen it not work enough times to know the need for a backup plan.
I’m not trying to speak out against Keith’s recommended response at all. I just wanted to poke around for alternatives. Always follow PACE when planning (Primary, Alternate, Contingency, Emergency).
Lean into it and worship loud and proud … So, like cheerleaders chanting “We Got Spirit, Yes We Do. We got spirit, how about you?” then? Really? 🙄 This isn’t some game.
Soldiers of Christ to the front!
You should have full CCTV coverage of all public places in your church. The bad guys know that there will be no CCTV cameras in bathrooms. Security should be on the edges of the room, but in far enough from the door not to be targeted by the invaders on their entry covertly down the center isle. If you live in a stand-your-ground state you are able to force to subdue the invaders and hold them for th police. Anyone filming should be targeted preferentially and every cell phone should be confiscated, and turned over to the police . Anyone assaulting anyone should be dealt with forcefully. A cellular/wifi blocker mighr be useful if they are live streaming. The people are violently invding your houes/property and are not afraid of hurting men, women, or children do not be afraid to return the favor.
A few thoughts Keith can critique:
1. Every church is different. Our stage is about 150' wide with stairs from the sanctuary floor to the stage on both sides. Having one Safety Team member at the top of those stairs once the stage is cleared or before the protesters breach the stage, armed with some gel pepper spray, could be most beneficial in keeping the stage secure. Using elevation to your advantage, spraying them in the face as they look up, while walking up stairs, would be relatively easy.
2. There are extra mics on our stage for the worship singers. Many churches still use fixed mics for the pastor. Gaining access to a mic would be a great way to project over the shouting and chaos they intentionally create. I happen to sit behind the sound board in our church and they keep a mic there. I may brief the head worship tech that handing a hot mic off to us to make announcements and give direction may be advantageous
3. Using the church PA system, publicly advising, in a firm command voice that the protesters are to leave private property, IMMEDIATELY might be extremely helpful should any litigation arise afterwards. Video recordings would capture that announcement. Further advise them that failure to comply will result in arrest for trespassing. Likely, they won't care. These lunatics live to be arrested.
4. Any protesters blocking exits should be dealt with promptly and forceably. Enlist help from members of the church to have them unblock and allow exit of the sanctuary. There are more of us than of them.
5. We fully expect 10-20% of our congregation to be carrying concealed during any service. Some may inevitably break leather and present a weapon in self defense. Discourage this immediately by loud commands to "STOW YOUR WEAPON" and de-conflict the situation quickly by getting those individuals out of the sanctuary as fast as possible after they stow their weapon. Random shots in a packed sanctuary is a nightmare situation. Those defensive shooters may get shot by other armed churchgoers.
6. Our church is blessed to have a County Sheriff who takes church safety seriously. Our church pays for a Deputy at nearly every service or function. His main task is directing traffic after each service but he is equipped with one of our radios and maintains a listening watch. He can be in our sanctuary within a minute or so of being notified. His call for back-up will generate a much faster response from law enforcement than a 911 call will. Plus, his mobile unit parked out front during service serves as a deterrent.
7. There is an old saying I have found true: We rise to our lowest level of training when things get difficult. Take Keith's advice in coming up with a plan for incidents like these and practice them periodically. These protesters are trying to instill fear while promoting chaos and control over the church goers and staff. They clearly want everything documented on video so they can sue later. Don't give them anything to sue for. Don't hesitate to quickly escalate your response when approaching RED LINES like blocking exits or threatening the kids.
Why does the word 'churches' mean? There's only one church, thus saith the Lord "Upon this rock I will build my 'church' not churches. 🙏
STOP fixating on one word or phrase. That is how cults are frormed.
Question: is it a red line when a protester/ invader blocks the aisle and prevents a worshiper from leaving? Something like false imprisonment?
After I warn him or her to get out of my way can I drop him/her? Do I need to try to push him out of the way first, and then drop him? Or what? Thanks so much, keith.
Knock these knickers out
Since a guy from the State Attorney's Office was part of the protest, how is the State not wide open for civil litigation for false imprisonment? I smell money.
Are there any instances of protesters being physically aggressive towards church members? Not verbally; physically. I know they are trained to do everything possible to cause someone else to initiate a physical altercation so they can claim “victim” status. My concern is, that if we use physical force or OC we will be playing right into their hands. They want optics; like the kid crying in the pew in Minneapolis. It shows that we fear them and that they control whatever they want. What if we played their game, and instead of trying to end or evacuate the service we leaned into it and worshipped loud and proud. We can protect childrens areas and the stage without backing down. Just a thought.
Physically blocking access to children and not moving when you try to is unacceptable. I'm not your lawyer, but I have had been in countless incidents like this. You can either dump them (drop them to the ground) to get to the kids or to protect your stage, or you can use OC. Can we agree that blocking access to kids is a red line? I hope so. Pepper spray is very effective. I suggest everyone get training in it AND get sprayed themselves. You will understand how effective it is. Optics wise, we need to put safety of our congregants and our children over optics.
I agree very much with you that there are red lines, and accessing the stage and blocking kids are those lines. However, I think we should be locking the kids down out of protection, and rather than reflexively dismissing for everyone to run and grab kids we resume worship at a volume louder than theirs, and buy time till police get there.
Also, I’ve been trained with and sprayed by OC (FLETC). It had little effect on me. I’ve seen the same in the field. OC is a good tool, but like any tool it’s great when it works but you’d better have a plan if it doesn’t.
Well now that's not encouraging. Have you tried the OC that Keith recommends. I can't find where I made note of the name.
I’ve only used the Sabre MK-2 stream cans. That’s what we carried and had used on us when I was in the military. I’m not sure what all brands the LE agencies used that I responded with in the field (I’ve been a firefighter the last 13 years), but I know I’ve been to a few scenes where OC didn’t work on some people, including mass protests. In fact, all it did for those whom it didn’t affect was piss them off more.
I have nothing against OC or its use at all. On most people it works great, but as I mentioned earlier I’ve seen it not work enough times to know the need for a backup plan.
I’m not trying to speak out against Keith’s recommended response at all. I just wanted to poke around for alternatives. Always follow PACE when planning (Primary, Alternate, Contingency, Emergency).
Sarcasm Alert ‼️
Lean into it and worship loud and proud … So, like cheerleaders chanting “We Got Spirit, Yes We Do. We got spirit, how about you?” then? Really? 🙄 This isn’t some game.
"Hit 'em high, hit 'em low. Hit 'em where their peanuts grow!"
Ha ha! That pretty good. I’ll have cheerleaders with pom poms fill the isles while we chant and signs saying “Jesus forgives Democrats too!”
(Sarcasm coming back at ya)