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Yet again over the weekend, we saw 2 more shootings in America, leaving at least 20 dead in the Texas city of el Paso and nine killed in Dayton, Ohio. Many more have been left injured. These attacks have come less than a week after a teenage gunman killed 3 people at a California food festival. As Dayton brings the number of shootings in America this year to 250, one commentator wrote that mass shootings remain the most terrible metric that distinguishes America today from the rest of the world. But we’ve seen this all before for we have the same conversation after each mass shooting, the inevitable debate about gun control versus mental-health issues, white supremacist ideologies versus Islamist terror. The debate becomes factionalised, politicised and in the end, nothing changes and then the next mass shooting happens. In fact there’s been no major gun-control legislation in the 7 years since Sandy Hook, the tragedy that was supposed to change everything. . So it wasn’t surprising to see the hashtag `thoughts and prayers’ being used to mock the status quo, it’s a phrase embedded in our post tragedy lexicon, but nowadays expresses only people’s anger and frustration - people are fed up, they don’t want to hear `thoughts and prayers’ regurgitated from politicians because as a Christian theologian recently said, ` there is something deeply hypocritical about praying for a problem you are unwilling to resolve.’ But while gun control remains a hugely divisive issue in America, it seems there is a greater call for change, as more and more demand legislation which makes it harder for people to own guns and to randomly kill innocent people. When families are left heartbroken, thoughts and prayers seem like empty words – they neither tackle the problem nor save lives. We know that actions speak louder than words in most contexts. And for me, faith must also prioritise action for faith is a doing word. Suffering in all its forms may be part of the human condition, but belief in God demands rightful action, the imperative to make things better for others where and when we can. The Qur’an speaks of belief as action and repeats throughout ` those who believe and act rightfully.’ Without just and rightful action, our faith is diminished. And yet listening to American news yesterday, many communities wanted to come together in prayer for sometimes prayer is our only refuge. David Stout, a commissioner from El Paso, said ‘a lot of us will be going to church and praying even harder.’ So although the phrase thoughts and prayers can ring hollow, for the families now in so much pain and shock, there might be some solace in seeing their communities come together in solidarity and to share their grief.