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 targeting a mosque in San Diego 鈥� the latest in a spate of recent attacks targeting religious buildings 鈥� 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 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 .
Sept. 29, 2025: Four people were killed and nine more wounded when a man in Michigan 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 responders. The FBI said he had 鈥渁nti-religious beliefs against the Mormon religious community.鈥�
Aug. 27, 2025: Two children were killed and several others injured in a 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鈥檚 school.
Oct. 27, 2018: Eleven Jews attending services at the 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 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 . The victims included the senior pastor, Clementa Pinckney. The avowed white supremacist awaits execution as the .
Aug. 5, 2012: Six people at the 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.
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