It was every parent’s worst nightmare. In 2010, Kate and Andy Grosmaire, just after returning home from a Palm Sunday church service, would open their door to a Sheriff who told them their daughter Ann had been shot in the head.
Even more shocking, the shooter was their 19-year-old’s high school sweetheart, Conor McBride, the man who they thought would one day be their son-in-law.
“I couldn't process why that would have happened, I knew it had to have been an accident,” Kate told US TV programme The 700 Club.
But it was no accident. A two-day argument had escalated until Conor threatened to kill himself, but then pulled the shotgun trigger in the young Ann’s face. Conor immediately turned himself in to the authorities.
As Andy was praying beside his wounded daughter’s bed at 2am, he believed that Ann was communicating without words, urging her father: “Forgive him.”
“I finally said: ‘I’ll try.’”
But then a remarkable spiritual experience would enter this most tragic of situations as Ann’s life support was turned off.
“What I saw was Christ became one with her, not separate but just as one, completely together,” recalls Andy. “I started sobbing and it was because I realised that Christ was with my daughter and I realised that it was not Ann asking me to forgive Conor, it was Jesus.”
Soon afterwards, Kate saw that Conor had put her name on the prison visitation list, and she went to see him on Good Friday, the day her daughter died.
Conor sat down on the other side of the glass, picked up the phone, and said: ‘I'm so, so, so sorry.’ He was crying.”
She told him of their love and forgiveness, a decision that would bring release for them as well as for Conor. She wrote: “The power of forgiveness is not for the offender. It’s for the person who is forgiving."
Kate told her story in a 2016 memoir: ‘Forgiving My Daughter's Killer: A True Story of Loss, Faith, and Unexpected Grace.’
You can read this story in April's Good News newspaper or on our website at www.goodnews-paper.org.uk/viewlatesteditionpage.htm
Even more shocking, the shooter was their 19-year-old’s high school sweetheart, Conor McBride, the man who they thought would one day be their son-in-law.
“I couldn't process why that would have happened, I knew it had to have been an accident,” Kate told US TV programme The 700 Club.
But it was no accident. A two-day argument had escalated until Conor threatened to kill himself, but then pulled the shotgun trigger in the young Ann’s face. Conor immediately turned himself in to the authorities.
As Andy was praying beside his wounded daughter’s bed at 2am, he believed that Ann was communicating without words, urging her father: “Forgive him.”
“I finally said: ‘I’ll try.’”
But then a remarkable spiritual experience would enter this most tragic of situations as Ann’s life support was turned off.
“What I saw was Christ became one with her, not separate but just as one, completely together,” recalls Andy. “I started sobbing and it was because I realised that Christ was with my daughter and I realised that it was not Ann asking me to forgive Conor, it was Jesus.”
Soon afterwards, Kate saw that Conor had put her name on the prison visitation list, and she went to see him on Good Friday, the day her daughter died.
Conor sat down on the other side of the glass, picked up the phone, and said: ‘I'm so, so, so sorry.’ He was crying.”
She told him of their love and forgiveness, a decision that would bring release for them as well as for Conor. She wrote: “The power of forgiveness is not for the offender. It’s for the person who is forgiving."
Kate told her story in a 2016 memoir: ‘Forgiving My Daughter's Killer: A True Story of Loss, Faith, and Unexpected Grace.’
You can read this story in April's Good News newspaper or on our website at www.goodnews-paper.org.uk/viewlatesteditionpage.htm
It was every parent’s worst nightmare. In 2010, Kate and Andy Grosmaire, just after returning home from a Palm Sunday church service, would open their door to a Sheriff who told them their daughter Ann had been shot in the head.
Even more shocking, the shooter was their 19-year-old’s high school sweetheart, Conor McBride, the man who they thought would one day be their son-in-law.
“I couldn't process why that would have happened, I knew it had to have been an accident,” Kate told US TV programme The 700 Club.
But it was no accident. A two-day argument had escalated until Conor threatened to kill himself, but then pulled the shotgun trigger in the young Ann’s face. Conor immediately turned himself in to the authorities.
As Andy was praying beside his wounded daughter’s bed at 2am, he believed that Ann was communicating without words, urging her father: “Forgive him.”
“I finally said: ‘I’ll try.’”
But then a remarkable spiritual experience would enter this most tragic of situations as Ann’s life support was turned off.
“What I saw was Christ became one with her, not separate but just as one, completely together,” recalls Andy. “I started sobbing and it was because I realised that Christ was with my daughter and I realised that it was not Ann asking me to forgive Conor, it was Jesus.”
Soon afterwards, Kate saw that Conor had put her name on the prison visitation list, and she went to see him on Good Friday, the day her daughter died.
Conor sat down on the other side of the glass, picked up the phone, and said: ‘I'm so, so, so sorry.’ He was crying.”
She told him of their love and forgiveness, a decision that would bring release for them as well as for Conor. She wrote: “The power of forgiveness is not for the offender. It’s for the person who is forgiving."
Kate told her story in a 2016 memoir: ‘Forgiving My Daughter's Killer: A True Story of Loss, Faith, and Unexpected Grace.’
You can read this story in April's Good News newspaper or on our website at www.goodnews-paper.org.uk/viewlatesteditionpage.htm
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