Statistically, attending a weekly worship service is a remarkably safe thing to do. Global annual attendance totals many billions; the number of people killed in attacks on individual houses of worship in any given year is generally less than a few hundred. Killings in the U.S. are even more rare.
But an attack on Monday targeting a mosque in San Diego — the latest in a spate of recent attacks targeting religious buildings — has intensified fear among
clergy and worshippers.
Here are some of the notable attacks on U.S. houses of worship in the past 15 years:
May 18, 2026: Two teenage suspects opened fire at the largest mosque in San Diego County on Monday, killing a security guard and two other men before killing themselves, authorities said. The case is being investigated as a hate crime.
March 12, 2026: An armed man crashed his pickup truck into the Temple Israel synagogue in the Detroit area and then killed himself while exchanging gunfire with security. The 41-year-old shooter had just lost four members of his family in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon. Israeli authorities said some of his family were members of the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
Sept. 29, 2025: Four people were killed and nine more wounded when a man in Michigan drove his pickup truck into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Grand Blanc Township and set its chapel on fire. The 40-year-old gunman was killed by law enforcement responders. The FBI said he had “anti-religious beliefs against the Mormon religious community.”
Aug. 27, 2025: Two children were killed and several others injured in a shooting during Mass at the Church of the Annunciation in Minneapolis. The shooter, who authorities say died of a self-inflicted gunshot, was a former student at the parish’s school.
Oct. 27, 2018: Eleven Jews attending services at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh were fatally shot by a white supremacist with a history of antisemitism. The gunman faces execution after his conviction on multiple federal charges.
Nov. 5, 2017: A family feud is believed to have prompted the deadliest mass shooting in modern Texas history. Twenty-five people, including a pregnant woman, were killed at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs.
June 17, 2015: A young man participated in a Bible study session at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and then killed nine people. The victims included the senior pastor, Clementa Pinckney. The avowed white supremacist awaits execution as the first person in the U.S. sentenced to death for a federal hate crime.
Aug. 5, 2012: Six people at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in the town of Oak Creek died shortly after being shot by a 41-year-old white supremacist who had discussed a racial holy war. One of the injured victims died in 2020 from his head wound, becoming the seventh fatality.
