Matt Henry rings the bell at St. Andrew’s Mission in honor of those who have lost their lives to COVID-19 on Tuesday, Jan. 19, 2021.

MISSION — As Matt Henry stood alone in front of St. Andrew’s Mission on Tuesday, Jan. 19, he checked his watch repeatedly.

As his watch ticked over to 2:30 p.m. the retired pastor reached up, grasped the rope hanging from the mission’s bell and began to ring it. The sound of the bell rolled across the neighboring fields for four minutes as Henry rang it, the rhythm changing only briefly as he switched arms.

Henry said he rang the bell one minute for every hundred thousand people who have died as a result of COVID-19 in the United States. The U.S. COVID-19 death toll crossed 400,000 people on Jan. 19, according to The Associated Press.

“It’s the right thing to do,” he said.

The bell ringing was a part of a national movement to honor the victims of COVID-19 through a synchronized bell ringing beginning at 5:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Henry felt as though the moment was both one of unity and reflection on the last year, and wanted to bring that to the church he attends.

“I knew it was going to be an isolated thing, but I asked the priest and he said it would be great,” he said.

Henry, a retired pastor, likened the moment to one he experienced while serving as the pastor at the First United Methodist Church in Pendleton in the early 2000s. Henry said the church held a remembrance service for those killed in action as a result of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“We had a special requiem service for the dead one night and it was just about 2,000 dead at that point,” he said. “Three other people and I rang that [gong] for every name — we’d read a name and ring the gong — it was a fitting thing to do.”

Henry said he felt it was important to find ways to honor those who have died and felt as though he could do his part by ringing the bell at St. Andrew’s Mission as a sign of remembrance.

“I think we owe it to the dead — we owe something to the dead,” he said.