Multiple gunmen<\/a> opened fire on worshippers and detonated explosives at St. Francis Catholic Church in southwestern Nigeria, killng at least 50 people including women and children, according to a hospital doctor and media report. Legislator Ogunmolasuyi Oluwole said the attackers targeted the church as worshippers gathered on Pentecost Sunday.<\/p>\n The gunmen shot at people outside and inside the church building, killing and injuring worshippers, said Funmilayo Ibukun Odunlami, police spokesperson for Ondo state.<\/p>\n It is said such attacks are rare in southwest Nigeria. Ondo state Governor Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, who visited the scene of the attack and injured persons in the hospital, said the Sunday’s incident as”a great massacre” that should not be allowed to happen again.<\/p>\n President Muhammadu Buhari condemned the attack, calling it “heinous”, and the Vatican said Pope Francis was praying for the victims who had been “painfully stricken in a moment of celebration”.<\/p>\n “It is so sad that while the Holy Mass was going on, unknown gunmen attacked St Francis Catholic Church…leaving many feared dead and many others injured and the Church violated,” said Catholic Church spokesman in Nigeria, Reverend Augustine Ikwu.<\/p>\n Funmilayo Ibukun Odunlami, police spokesperson for Ondo said the police were investigating the cause of the attack.\u00a0\u00a0The identity and motive of the attackers was not immediately clear.\u00a0\u00a0Ikwu said the bishop and priests from the parish had survived the attack unharmed.<\/p>\n A doctor at a hospital in Owo told Reuters that at least 50 bodies had been brought into two hospitals in the town from the attack. The doctor, who declined to be named because he is not authorized to speak to the press, also said there was a need for blood donations to treat the injured.<\/p>\n Nigeria is battling an Islamist insurgency<\/a> in the northeast and armed gangs who carry out attacks and kidnappings for ransom, mostly in the northwest. However, in the southwest, attacks such as this are rare it is said.<\/p>\n