The peace around St. Martin De Porres church was violently disturbed around 8:30 Sunday night when, after the Sunday evening mass, assistant pastor Bryan Christopher was jacked and two robbers made off with the entire Sunday collection, estimated to be around $1,000.

Christopher told Amandala that he was going from the church building through a side door to the rectory when a parishioner reminded him to take the basket with the offering.

“There were a couple of people out here, including Pastor Mac, who was talking to one of our parishioners,” he noted.

Christopher said he had not viewed with any suspicion or apprehension the presence of two men who were lingering around the church.

“Suddenly, I see this hand come down and smack the basket out of my hand. At that point, I knew. I turned around and the guy had a gun pointed at me”, Christopher explained. “So I said ‘take it, it’s yours. The money is yours. Just don’t hurt anybody’,” Christopher went on to relate.

According to Christopher, the gunman then began to point his gun at Pastor Mac and an individual to whom Mac was speaking, as he instructed everyone to move backward.

Christopher said that although the men were not wearing masks, he would not be able to identify them if he saw them again, because the moment of the encounter was so brief and intense and his adrenaline was running so high. “It happened so fast,” he added, “I would say about 30 seconds.”

Christopher said that while the robbery was still in progress, someone was insisting that they call 911.

“911 were called before this was really over,” Christopher said.

Two parishioners who saw the young men with the church basket followed them after they got into a car and were able to get a license plate number, Christopher stated.

He said it took a while for the crime technicians to get there, because they were dealing with a shooting, but when they came they dusted for fingerprints.

“Things are violent right now and we can’t expect to escape that,” Christopher said, “I feel a lot of gratitude that nobody got hurt. It could have been much worse.”

He said that he hopes the police find the thieves and that they get a chance to meet them, and let them know that they are welcome here.

“These are exactly the kind of kids that we need to work with and get them jobs. It motivates me to know that we got work to do with desperate people who do desperate things,” said Christopher.