Members of Congress are honoring four black girls at the Alabama church where they died in a Ku Klux Klan bombing 50 years ago.
About a dozen members of Congress applauded families of the girls during a commemoration Friday at 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham.
Democratic Rep. John Lewis of Georgia recalled crying at the sight of the church after the blast. The Alabama native was a civil rights organizer at the time.
A bomb detonated outside the church on Sept. 15, 1963, killing the children.
A sister of one of the victims was critically injured but survived. She was in the audience at the church for the commemoration.
The event was organized by the congressional black caucus.