A single bullet fired at Utah Valley University killed one and traumatized an entire community.
In the shadow of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, UVU leaders are calling for unity and peace, as the Trump administration, in contrast, has called for retribution against the political left.
The school’s Friday night “Vigil for Unity” at the UCCU Center on the Orem campus mourned Kirk’s death. A few hundred students and community members attended, and speakers expressed condolences to his family. A giant American flag hung behind the stage, a video montage of Kirk played, choirs sang, there was a moment of silence and people read biblical scriptures.
Security was tight nine days after the shooting. Attendees were prohibited from bringing in any bags. When the student ROTC presented the U.S. and Utah state flags on stage, a speaker announced that the ceremonial rifles they held did not work.
Speakers spent the majority of their time addressing those who witnessed the violence in their backyard. They asked people to come together.
“Shock, grief, abandonment, fear and hurt have filled our hearts since Sept. 10,” university President Astrid Tuminez said to the crowd.
But in that pain, she commended Utah for its response.
“I have seen goodness and mercy. Our community, the wounded, showed up to serve one another,” Tuminez said. “Hundreds, if not thousands, offered prayers for peace, clarity and resilience. We listened and gave each other patience and grace.”
While everyone’s hearts may be broken for different reasons, “the pain is the same,” Tuminez told them. That raw emotion is an opportunity to soften and connect with others. She asked attendees to consider, “What small step can I take to mend what is broken?”
“I urge each of us to remember that love can be stronger than fear,” she said. “May peace, love and grace heal us in all the parts that we are broken.”
Student body president Kyle Cullimore acknowledged that peace can feel hard to talk about in the wake of such violence.
“This past week and a half has reminded me of how fragile life can be, and in a couple of seconds, countless lives were changed,” Cullimore said. “The tragedy on our campus has reminded me that violence doesn’t just happen out there in the world somewhere.”
The shooting, Cullimore said, has “reminded us how deeply in times of need, we utterly and desperately need each other.” And when you’re running for your life, “those differences between us that used to seem so big turn into something so small.”
It’s tempting, in the aftermath, he said, to close off and focus on finding a group to blame, but “we as a community need to stop villainizing those we may not understand.”
Instead, the school has a chance to set a different example.
“We can be the kind of place where disagreement doesn't erase our dignity, where differences don't erase our humanity,” Cullimore said.
The shooting thrust the state’s largest public university, a historically commuter campus, into an international spotlight. His call was not to let the tragedy define the institution, but to define the moment by how the community chooses to respond. Cullimore encouraged his peers to ask for help and reach out to others.
Outside the vigil, Orem resident Kortney Osborne held a sign that read “I love you.” The mom of a 17-year-old stepped into the role of mom for anyone on campus who needed to be told that they were loved. She stood by Stephanie Sonntag, a trauma therapist from Farmington. The pair has been out on campus every day since the shooting to talk to anyone who wanted to talk or point people to mental health resources. They said some have come up sobbing or angry. Some are scared. The pair said most people are sad and discouraged about the state of the world.
“Everybody's hurting. Let's just maybe turn down the temperature a little bit and just connect on a human level,” Osborne said.
From speaking with other Orem community members, Osborne learned there is a “sense of guilt” because it happened in their hometown.
The suspected shooter is 22-year-old Tyler Robinson from Washington County. Prosecutors allege he drove 3.5 hours from his home to the event at UVU and fired a single shot from the roof of a campus building, fatally hitting Kirk in the neck.
“I think as a community, maybe that guilt is turning into action to say, ‘OK, what are we gonna do and turn this into a good thing?’” Osborne said. “If it did happen here, how can we respond differently than maybe somewhere else would have?”
Osborne did not know who Kirk was before his death. While much of the national conversation has focused on the political dynamics of the assassination, Osborne said there were also 3,000 people who had their eyes fixed on a man as they witnessed him being killed. And now, she said, there are thousands more students who attend UVU and wonder whether it is safe to come to school anymore.
“I’m so amazed at the resilience of these students. I mean, it's incredible, like, the fact that they had the courage to even come back to class,” she said.
Osborne has a message for her community.
“Get off the internet and get out of your own echo chambers. Get to the present moment, put your feet in the grass.”
The connection needed right now, she said, won’t come from a screen, but connecting on a human level in person. Osborne said she’s showing up every day to show her love and “that we can unify in love.”
“Maybe that’s too big, maybe that’s a revolution that won’t be in my lifetime. But maybe we can start that revolution of love and acceptance and forgiveness,” she said.
As a trauma therapist, Sonntag said it will take time for Utahns to process the shooting and “no one does well when we shove our emotions down.” Events like the Vigil for Unity, Sonntag said, are like a collective ritual to promote healing and give closure to a devastating event.
Inside the vigil, Brigham Young University emerita professor and Catholic Lay Ecclesial Minister Juliana Boerio-Goates said across faith traditions and in psychology, an essential step to healing is forgiveness of “those whom we have perceived to wrong us.” She encouraged everyone to intentionally look for good and honorable things in others, including in those who have hurt them.
Both Goates and Tuminez quoted the famous prayer of St. Francis of Assisi.
Tuminez’s voice started to quaver with emotion as she said, “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love. Where there is injury, pardon. Where there is doubt, faith. Where there is despair, hope. Where there is darkness, light. Where there is sadness, joy.”
As the vigil ended, student body presidents from colleges across the state walked on stage to stand behind Cullimore.
“We are all here to join in this movement, a moment where we together commit to unity, a moment where we together commit to healing, a moment where we together commit to humanity together,” he said.
Cullimore instructed the crowd to light their electric candles and stand together. Some people in the audience yelled, “For Charlie.”
As people left the building, a pianist played the Christian hymn “God Be with You Till We Meet Again.”
