The “terrible conflagration” at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., Jan. 6 “is not altogether surprising,” said Jason Adkins, executive director of Minnesota Catholic Conference, in a statement shared on MCC’s social media platforms Jan. 7.

On Jan. 6, protesters supporting President Donald Trump stormed through Capitol security and entered the building while Congress was counting states’ electoral ballots. Congress was expected to confirm that former Vice President Joe Biden won the November election, despite Trump’s accusation that the election was fraudulent.

The mob entering the Capitol suspended the electoral count, with lawmakers rushing to safety. Some protesters were reportedly armed, and law enforcement found explosive devices on Capitol grounds. The protesters damaged the building, and Capitol police shot and killed one woman before the building was secured. A Capitol police officer was injured and later died, and three others died in medical events related to the Capitol breach.

As the nation grappled with what happened in an icon of American democracy, Adkins said politics “has become a power game of rewarding ‘in groups’ with the spoils of the state and punishing ‘out groups’ with its coercive power. Events like these are just fuel for that dynamic and will be exploited for those purposes. The corruption is deep. And it’s not someone else’s fault. We’ve all contributed in some way and will face a collective reckoning unless we repent and submit to God’s authority.”

He continued: “For some time, an increasingly secular society has translated the battle to be waged against sin in our own lives onto the playing field of politics. Blaming someone else is easier than convicting and reforming ourselves.

“We’ve embraced false salvation narratives of decline, fall and redemption, with some group or individual at the center of it as the corrupting force who must be overcome. It blinds us to our own shortcomings, our role in that process and in various injustices, and makes us captive to ideologies, demagogues and our imaginative reconstruction of the world.

“Coupled with the corruption of the political process and the lack of concern shown by elites toward the concerns of regular people, many feel dispossessed and have lost their sense of political agency. It is only a matter of time before this frustration gets taken out on individuals or institutions who are seen as the ‘bad guys.’

“And as sides harden along those ideological or partisan lines, convinced of the evil of the other side, and desiring to ‘fight back,’ violence is, eventually, an inevitable result.”

Catholic leaders across the country denounced the violence at the Capitol. Archbishop José Gomez of Los Angeles, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued a statement the evening of Jan. 6 saying he joined “people of goodwill in condemning the violence today at the United States Capitol.”

“This is not who we are as Americans,” he said, adding that he is praying for members of Congress, Capitol Hill staff members, police officers “and all those working to restore order and public safety.”

The archbishop called the peaceful transition of power “one of the hallmarks of this great nation” and stressed that in this “troubling moment, we must recommit ourselves to the values and principles of our democracy and come together as one nation under God.”

Adkins said that “perpetrating violence against others and the destruction of property as a political tool should be condemned, along with leaders who stoke anger and resentment for their own political fortunes. President Trump and his associates are, in part, responsible for what happened yesterday because of their rhetoric. His attempts to coerce others into undermining the rule of law are reprehensible, and he should be held to account. But he is hardly unique in our political landscape.

“We need a renewed commitment to civic friendship in our nation, to see each other as brothers and sisters with a common destiny regardless of our various identities or backgrounds.

“Ultimately, however, there is only one path of social reconciliation and fraternity in our nation: submission to the fatherhood of God through the blood of Jesus Christ. That starts with each one of us on a road to repentance and conversion. There is no order in the state without order in the souls of its people.”

Adkins said that his comments are his own, not representative of the state’s Catholic bishops, who comprise the MCC board of directors. MCC is the public policy voice of the Catholic Church in Minnesota.

Catholic News Service contributed to this story.