President Obama eulogizes state Sen. Pinckney (+ video)

Clementa Pinckney, the S.C. state senator and pastor gunned down with eight of his parishioners last week, was remembered Friday as a man of God and a public servant whose death could change race relations.

“What a life Clementa Pinckney lived. What an example he set. What a model for his faith,” said President Barack Obama, who delivered the minister-lawmaker’s eulogy at TD Arena in Charleston, around the corner from Pinckney’s Emanuel AME Church, where he was killed.

Grace and racial reconciliation were the themes during the nearly five-hour funeral service for the 41-year-old Pinckney, a Democrat from Jasper County.

State Sen. Gerald Malloy, D-Darlington, spoke about Pinckney’s generosity in allowing a stranger to join his historic African-American church’s Bible study last week. That stranger, Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old Columbia-area man who friends say spouted racist remarks, now stands accused of killing the pastor and eight others after spending an hour with them.

“Let us not close the door that Sen. Pinckney gave his life to open,” Malloy said. “Don’t let race, religion or politics close those doors.”

Obama said the nation does not need another “conversation about race – we talk a lot about race” – but to address its inequities and problems.

“We betray everything Rev. Pinckney stood for if we let ourselves slip into a comfortable silence again,” he said.

Malloy said Pinckney’s death already has led to significant change in South Carolina. “Clem, all the change that you wanted to see, all the change that you wanted to do ... because of you, we will see the Confederate flag come down” from the State House grounds.

Obama said he did not blame the Confederate flag for the killings, though Roof was photographed with the Civil War banner.

Still, removing the flag from the State House grounds, where it has flown since the early ’60s, is a step in the right direction, the president said.

“For many, black and white, that flag was a reminder of systemic oppression and racial subjugation. We see that now,” Obama said. “Removing the flag from this state’s capitol would not be an act of political correctness. It would not be an insult to the valor of Confederate soldiers. It would simply be acknowledgment that the cause for which they fought, the cause of slavery, was wrong.”

Obama praised Gov. Nikki Haley’s eloquence in her call to remove the flag, a move that legislators must make.

“By taking down that flag, we express God’s grace,” Obama said. “But I don’t think God wants us to stop there.”

Instead, the president spoke about the need to end poverty, improve schools and control guns in the wake of another mass shooting. “By making the moral choice to change, we express God’s grace.”

Obama closed the service by leading the 5,960 mourners in “Amazing Grace.”

The shock and grief of the mass murder brought a delegation from Washington, D.C., featuring Obama, first lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and several members of Congress, led by House Speaker John Boehner.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a front-runner for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, postponed a Philadelphia fundraiser to join mourners in Charleston. Civil rights activists Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton attended along with relatives of Martin Luther King Jr.

South Carolina’s top politicians – including Haley, U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Tim Scott, and U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn – also paid their respects.

‘I feel robbed, cheated’

They joined a diverse crowd, many dressed in Sunday church clothes as they swayed to hymns sung by a large choir.

Thomas Turnage, a Mount Pleasant medical device salesman, brought his young son to the service to show how the presence of the president and vice president sends a message.

“We’re not going to condone an environment of racism, and we’re not going to condone an environment of intimidation,” Turnage said. “We’re here to move forward and build a better foundation to build this country on.”

Hours before the service, the line to enter TD Arena stretched more than 10 blocks in downtown Charleston. Mourners waved fans and held umbrellas over their heads to stave off the 90-degree morning heat. An estimated 5,000 people were not able to get inside the arena, which quickly reached its capacity.

Mary Ellis wore a gold dress and hat for her alma mater Allen University, three of whose graduates killed in the massacre, including Pinckney. Ellis said she was stunned that a violent act took place at the same church where she once attended a friend’s wedding.

“I had to be here,” she said, waving a fan while waiting in line in front of Marion Square.

The service provided the first public reaction from Pinckney’s widow, Jennifer, who hid under a desk in a church office with one of the couple’s two daughters as her husband’s Bible study was attacked June 17.

Jennifer Pinckney’s anguish, shared by the thousands of mourners who came to viewings during the week at the State House, Ridgeland and Emanuel Church, came through in the message that she wrote in the program for her husband’s funeral service.

“You promised you would never leave me!” she wrote. “You promised that we would grow old together and spend our latter years without the demands of the church or the state. I feel robbed, cheated and cut short. I feel badly that our children will never have their father to watch them grow.”

Pinckney’s two daughters, Eliana and Malana, wrote messages in the program about how they would miss their father.

Obama met with victims’ families during his trip to Charleston.

“To the families of the fallen, the nation shares in your grief,” he said during the service. “Our pain cuts that much deeper because it happened in a church.”

‘Re-examining ... our culture’

Much work remains to be done to fix racial divisions in South Carolina, said Emily Davidson, a Northeast Richland resident who is going to law school after graduating from the College of Charleston.

“If there’s one good thing to come out of this, it is the fact that we are now re-examining the little parts of our culture that aren’t that cute, aren’t that healthy for everyone, aren’t good,” Davidson said an hour before the service started.

Some bitterness remains.

Roof’s racist remarks brought back “a lot of bad feelings,” said Turnage, who is African-American.

“Right now, a lot of people are saying, ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. “But, to be honest with you, I’m not at the point where I forgive.”

Still, Obama’s visit represented hope, Turnage said, carrying a message that “we’re going to manage this, we’re going to address it, and we’re going to move it forward.

“We’re going to strengthen this Union not just today but for 50 and 100 years down the road.”

This story was originally published June 26, 2015 at 5:50 AM with the headline "President Obama eulogizes state Sen. Pinckney (+ video)."