Ryan: Praying the right thing to do after mass shootings because it ‘works’

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) in an interview broadcast Monday dismissed criticism of his tweet saying the Texas shooting victims “need our prayers,” arguing “prayer works.”

“It’s disappointing. It’s sad, and this is what you’ll get from the far secular left. People who do not have faith, don’t understand faith, I guess I’d have to say,” Ryan told Fox News’s Laura Ingraham on “The Ingraham Angle” when asked about the criticism.

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“And it is the right thing to do, is to pray in moments like this because you know what? Prayer works.”

Ryan’s remarks come after he said Sunday that the mass shooting in Texas was “devastating.”

“Reports out of Texas are devastating,” Ryan wrote on Twitter. “The people of Sutherland Springs need our prayers right now.”

The speaker took heat on social media for the comment, with various users calling for gun control in the wake of the shooting that left 26 people dead after a gunman opened fire at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas.

“And I know you believe that and I believe that,” Ryan told Ingraham about the effectiveness of prayer.

“And when you hear the secular left doing this thing, no wonder you’ve got so much polarization and disunity in this country when people think like that.”