A prominent Christian leader and several other people were stabbed during a sermon in Sydney that was being streamed online, Australian media reported.
Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was celebrating Mass at Christ the Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley after 7 p.m. when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed him several times in the head. Live footage of the mass shows parishioners rushing towards Emmanuel before he was interrupted.
The church leader gained notoriety during the COVID pandemic, amassing a large online audience. A police operation is underway in Wakeley following reports of a stabbing.
Officers attached to the Fairfield District Police Department arrived at Welcome Street in Wakeley after reports of several people being stabbed. Officers arrested a man who is assisting police with the investigation.
The victims suffered non-life threatening injuries and are receiving all necessary treatment.
The stabbing was the second such offence in Sydney in recent days. After a knife-wielding attacker killed six people and injured several others in a stabbing at a Sydney shopping centre on Saturday, he was shot dead by police.
The 40-year-old suspect entered the Westfield shopping centre in Bondi Junction at about 3:10 p.m. local time and then left “very shortly” before returning at about 3:20 p.m. The man stabbed shoppers passing through the shopping centre, including a mother and her nine-month-old baby. Police said they would investigate whether the Sydney shopping centre attacker deliberately chose women.
