Thieves steal toilet during church burglary, Memphis pastor says

MEMPHIS, Tenn. ( WREG ) — A pastor said he walked into his South Memphis church on Sunday morning and found the building in disarray: the side door was ripped off, the speakers in the sanctuary were removed from the wall, and his office was ransacked. Even the toilet was missing.

"They stole everything that was not nailed down," Pastor Gregory Harris, of Greater New Hope Baptist Church, told Nexstar's WREG.

"The thing that got me the most was when I walked in my office, I could hear water running and the toilet was gone," Harris said. "They took the whole toilet."

He said thieves searched every inch of the building, including a crayon box left out for children.

"They just kind of went through all the papers, went through everything, emptied out the cabinets, dumped everything on the floor," Harris said.

The pastor told WREG that he feels "violated."

"It's so much robbing," he said. "It's so much killing. So much going on. People are just trying to be opportunists, and today they took an opportunity to vandalize God's house."

Despite the mess left behind, he said church service continued as normal.

"I was going to say we weren't going to have service," Harris said. "We weren't going to do nothing, but that would be giving them the victory."

As for those responsible, he has this message: "You might gain financial gain momentarily, but in the end what you've done will come back to haunt you later."

Memphis police said they are investigating. No further details have been released.