CHARLESTON, S.C. - Chris Singleton is sitting in the parking lot behind the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, his eyes fixed on the oldest AME church in the South, and now famous for the most horrific of reasons.

He grew up in this historic black church, founded in 1816, where civil rights marchers once gathered, and Booker T. Washington and Martin Luther King Jr., spoke from the pulpit. He was here virtually every Sunday, with his mom, and often times, Wednesday evenings too, at the weekly Bible Study class.

Singleton, 21, has been back a couple of times in the last couple of years, but hasn’t attended a church service here in seven months.

It was Feb. 13, 2017, to be precise.

The funeral service of his father.

Twenty months after the chilling murder of his mother in this same church.

Maybe one day, he’ll be back here again, when more years have passed, emotions are not as raw, the horrific memories not so fresh, and tourists stop taking all of those pictures in front of the church.

Just not now.

“When I go out here, there are people who will recognize me, and I know they mean well,’’ Singleton tells USA TODAY Sports, “but they say things like, “My uncle’s brother was murdered. So I know what you’re going through. I know what you’re feeling.’ It’s like they want to share their pain with you.

“They don’t mean anything bad by it, but I want to say, “No, you don’t know what I’m going through. You really don’t. You have no idea.’

"'You will never know.'"

Singleton’s dark brown eyes start blinking rapidly, he looks away, and we sit in the car in silence.

Charleston has been Singleton's hometown since he was 11 years old. It will always be home, he says.

He is a hero here in town.

He also happens to be a ballplayer.

Singleton, drafted in the 19th round in June out of Charleston Southern University, is a rookie minor-league outfielder in the Chicago Cubs organization. He hit .221 with 11 stolen bases in 39 games in his pro debut in the Arizona League and with Class A Eugene (Ore.), and now is back in the Cubs’ instructional league camp in Mesa, Ariz.

Singleton, who came home to Charleston for an eight-day break before instructional league, spent three hours last week with USA TODAY Sports, talking about the challenges of his first season, those exhausting eight-hour bus rides, the euphoria of his bases-loaded double off the center-field wall in his first home game, and the exasperation of his 0-for-22 slump.

He giggles about proposing to his girlfriend of five years, Mariana, a week ago in front of friends and family. He excitedly talks about having his sister, 17-year-old Camryn, and 14-year-old brother Caleb, moving back with him next week from his aunt’s house in Atlanta. He proudly chats about the four-bedroom home he recently found for the family, a room for everyone, including Christopher Nygel Singleton Jr., his son, which Mariana is expecting on Nov. 7.

Singleton’s voice is passionate, his conviction deep during lunch, but now his eyes are glassy, unable to take his eyes off the church, the one with a new wrought iron gate, padlocks around the doors to prevent visitors from stopping in as if it’s some sort of tourist attraction, the one he’ll never look at the same again.

'Love the way my mom would'

This is where it happened, right here in the church basement, the evening of June 17, 2015.

This is where a 21-year-old stranger walked into the church for 6 p.m. Bible Study Class, introduced himself, and was welcomed by 12 church members. He was handed a Bible, a worksheet, and he listened as they discussed the book of Mark’s parable of the sower.

Forty minutes later, they stood up for a final prayer, and closed their eyes, as Dylann Roof pulled a Glock .45-caliber pistol from his back pocket.

He began firing, 77 hollow point bullets in all, reloading seven times.

By the time he was done, nine people were dead.

One of the victims was 45-year Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, a beloved minister at the church, a speech pathologist and the girls track and field coach at Goose Creek High School.

The mother of three kids: Chris, Camryn and Caleb Singleton.

“I used to call her cell phone all of the time after it happened,’’ Singleton says, “just to listen to her voice mail. Then, about a year ago when I called, someone picked up. Someone new had her phone number. I just hung up. I didn’t want to spook the person.

“Now, I have this video of my mom praying on my phone, at a funeral service of her friend’s dad. She was ironically talking about how you get through that stuff. So I listen to that. It helps me get through tough times.’’

Roof, in the days after his arrest, told investigators that he killed the church members simply because of their skin color.

They were African-American.

He was a white supremacist.

He wanted to start a race war.

Christopher Nygel Singleton, just 18 years old at the time, refused to let it happen.

Singleton spoke to the community on the Charleston Southern University’s baseball field the day after his mom was murdered, six days before she was buried, and uttered the words that resonated throughout the world.

“Love is always stronger than hate,’’ Singleton said. “If we just love the way my mom would, then the hate won’t be nearly as strong as the love is.”

He then looked into the crowd, stared into the cameras and said: “We forgive him for what he’s done. There’s nothing but love from our side of the family.’’

He walked back to his car, lowered his head, and sobbed.

“The crazy thing when I spoke to everyone that night,’’ Singleton says, “is that everybody said my mom is speaking through me, which I believed at the time. Now, I think it was God using me, for that specific time.

“I still don’t understand it, but I do believe this happened for a reason, and I’m going to use it for good, you know. I’m not going to let it hinder me in any way. I’m going to use it to help, change things.’’

Singleton’s powerful message, really his mission statement, helped soothe the pain, squelch hostilities and bring Charleston together.

Sure, there was pain and anger in Charleston after the massacre, but it was almost entirely channeled into outpourings of love and consolation, trying to repair a heart-broken community.

Just four days after the shooting, thousands of people held hands in a unity chain, marching on the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge, spanning the Cooper River from Mount Pleasant to Charleston.

“People say I helped Charleston not become one of those places with all of those riots and stuff,’’ Singleton says. “People say, 'Chris, you don’t know what you did, man.’ I just say, 'This community, we all did that together, honestly.'

“I just think I was chosen for what happened to me.’’

Roof was charged with 33 federal hate crimes for the slaughtering of nine African-American parishioners, never once expressing the slightest remorse, saying he would do it again.

“I went to the trial a couple of times when it first started,’’ Singleton says, barely speaking above a whisper. “My aunt went every single day. But I couldn’t do it anymore. I just couldn’t.’’

The trial lasted seven days. The jury deliberated less than two hours. Roof was the first federal hate-crime defendant to be sentenced to death.

“When he was sentenced, I really had no reaction,’’ Singleton says. "I was just numb, really. My mom was already gone. Nothing was going to bring her back.’’

Less than a month after the sentencing, Chris Singleton, the ex-husband of Sharonda, and father of Chris, Camryn and Caleb, died.

“My dad, he was never the same after my mom passed,’’ Singleton said. “My dad had a huge struggle with alcohol my whole life, but when that hit, it hit him hard. He died of a broken heart.’’

Praying for America

Former President Barack Obama, who delivered a moving eulogy at the church and sang “Amazing Grace,’’ was so inspired by Singleton’s peaceful message that he and First Lady Michelle sent him a hand-written letter. Vice President Joe Biden telephoned and gave him his home phone number. Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton dropped by the house. New England Patriots Super Bowl MVP quarterback Tom Brady invited him to a game against the Buffalo Bills.

The New York Yankees had him take batting practice, and throw out the ceremonial first pitch, along with Camryn and Caleb. Pittsburgh Pirates center fielder Andrew McCutchen, his idol, offered a prayer on Twitter. The city of Paterson, N.J., named a street after his mother. His college will have a dedication next spring for the Sharonda Coleman-Singleton Enrichment Center.

“But you know what the coolest thing to happen to me?’’ Singleton says. "There was this kid, named Jackson, from South Carolina, and they had this hero thing for his church, and he wrote me down as his hero."

“My hero is Chris Singleton because he gave passion to stand up to others,’’ Jackson Howard, a sixth-grader from Fort Hill, S.C., wrote. “He is forgiving to people who make him hurt on the inside and he is telling people to love and not hate, because of his mother's loss.’’

“That’s what was so crazy,’’ Singleton says. “Even this past season, when I had a bad game, I couldn’t be mad because there’s still these little kids with their parents in the stands. They say, “Hey Chris, I heard what you’ve been through. Thank you so much for your strength. I love how you carry yourself. I love the message you’re sending.’’

Singleton listens, grabs the pen with his right hand, signs his name, and underneath writes: Love>Hate.

“The strength he has is just amazing,’’ Mariana says. “I don’t know anybody who could be that strong. There are times I know he’s hurting, and I’ll catch him crying here and there, but he wants to be so strong for everybody, especially for his brother and sister.

“The most emotional I’ve seen him was his father’s funeral, being back in church for the first time, thinking of his mom. It just really hit him.’’

Singleton realizes his life could have ended that evening, too. He was playing a summer-league game with the North Charleston Dixie Majors the evening of the massacre. If not for the ballgame, he might have been at the church with his mom at the Bible Study.

“We talked about it many times,’’ Mariana says, “and I tell him, “Maybe it was God’s plan for you to inspire so many people. He needs you.’’’

It was too painful for Singleton to go back and live at his mother’s home after the killing. He stopped by a couple of times to collect mail, and some belongings, before selling the home. His proudest possessions are his mother's bibles. They were all over the house. There may have been a dozen bibles, perhaps even more. He took them all, and still carries three of them wherever he travels on the road, reading the Scripture every morning.

“My mom made sure to read the Bible, from cover to cover, every year,’’ Singleton says, “but I didn’t really read the Bible myself until my mom passed. I always prayed, but I didn’t really have a relationship, you know what I mean? When this happened, I really wanted to talk to God myself.

“Now, I have that relationship with God. It probably wouldn’t have happened without my mom."

Singleton now prays for the nation’s healing, soothing the unrest in cities, calming tension between the populace and police force, and easing the anger and distrust toward President Trump and the White House, where athletes are taking a stand by refusing to stand during the national anthem.

“It just shows how much work,’’ Singleton says, “that we still have got to go. We still have so many things we need to work on. That’s why I really, really want to use my story to help other people out. If anybody should feel angry, it should be me, after everything I went through, but I'm not.

“Sometimes, I sit back and I think about what happened, and I ask myself why. But I really believe it happened for a reason. So I’m going to use it for good. I’m going to use it to help change some things, change some lives.

“There are probably some people out there who are probably having some of the same thoughts (Roof) had, you know. There’s some cold people out here in the world.

“Maybe I can make a difference.’’

Singleton’s minor league season will be over on Oct. 7, when instructional league concludes. When he gets back, his family will be reunited after Camryn and Caleb stayed with their mother's sister in Atlanta.

Camryn wants to graduate from Goose Creek High, where Chris attended, and his mom taught. Caleb wants to play baseball there, too, just like his big brother.

Singleton, a speedy outfielder who eliminated a toe tap in his hitting mechanics, is tentatively scheduled to open next season at Class A South Bend (Ind.), and if he shows progress, could wind up next year at the Cubs' high Class A affiliate in Myrtle Beach, a two-hour drive from Charleston.

Yet, regardless of whether Singleton becomes a major league star, a journeyman, or doesn’t reach the big leagues at all, he says Charleston will always remain home, where his new family will bloom as he continues to impart the lessons of love already learned.

“We can’t wait,’’ says Singleton, who wears a cross filled with his mother’s ashes, and his father’s dog tags for every game. “We’re a family. And we have our mom watching over us.

“We miss her, but we feel her, every single day.’’

Gallery: Forging on after tragedy