Police were called after an uninvited guest startled worshippers inside a North Texas church on Sunday.
It happened during services at Armstrong Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Arlington.
"We have a homeless shelter down the street from us, and there is always somebody from that homeless shelter coming by. So we are always feeding people from it," said the Rev. Andre Waits, senior pastor at Armstrong Chapel AME Church.
Waits said he has been thinking about how his church can continue its program for the homeless following the massacre that left nine people dead last week at an AME church in Charleston, S.C.
"And even as I was coming in, I was thinking to myself, how do I continue on after the stuff that happened last week, because we always have different people, get different people that we don't know coming into the church. Do we stop doing that or do we just try to be more cautious?" Waits said.
Waits said when he encountered the man Sunday, he said he first brought him in, but as he went on, he realized there were things that did not make sense in the man's story. He also showed several prescriptions, and said, using the words, that he "went off the deep end" recently, Waits said.
Parishoners were concerned, and that is when the pastor had somebody call the police.
Local
The latest news from around North Texas.
Police came, and after that, the man went on his way, after getting a meal at the church.
"As a pastor, I have to tell them, 'Hey, this is the church.' We are still have to continue to keep the doors open. You never know who is going to need us, what is going to happen, what is going to come in, but you can't run away from it all because somebody who legitimately needs the church is going to come in and we are going to wind up turning them away," added Waits.
