Gabriel Stokes (The Walking Dead)

Father Gabriel Stokes
Gabriel, as portrayed by Seth Gilliam in the television series.
The Walking Dead character
Portrayed by	Seth Gilliam
First appearance	Comic: Issue #61 Television: "Strangers" (episode 5.02) (2014)
Last appearance	Comic: Issue #158
Created by	Robert Kirkman Tony Moore Charlie Adlard
Profile
Occupation	Episcopal priest Preacher for Alexandria

Father Gabriel Stokes is a fictional character from the comic book series The Walking Dead and is portrayed by Seth Gilliam in the television series of the same name. He is an Episcopal priest from Georgia who has isolated himself from the outside world since the beginning of the outbreak, after shutting out the other members of his flock inadvertently causing their deaths. He is struggling to come to terms with the new reality he faces and his own faith.

Since the start of the apocalypse, Gabriel has barricaded himself in his parish, St. Sarah's Episcopal Church. He had been hiding within the church walls from the undead and surviving off of canned goods from the parish food pantry. It is revealed that he is a widower and that he likely lost his wife to the zombie plague. He has survived over several months alone in the church by turning away his followers and any other civilians when the zombie attacks started, saving him from internal conflict. As a consequential result, however, he now feels extreme remorse.

Gabriel is first encountered by the group days following their escape from Terminus. He brings Rick and company to his church, where they stay. A cannibal group ambushes them at the church and is killed in the process; Gabriel is appalled by the brutality he sees before him. This sets in motion a feeling of great distrust towards Rick as the leader.

The group leaves the church before long. When they arrive at the Alexandria Safe-Zone, he attempts to convince the leader Douglas Monroe to banish the group from this new community, which proves pointless as Douglas trusts them. Since this failed attempt, Gabriel has reluctantly come to terms with the group's permanence and has since settled in to his role as Alexandria's sole reverend, having his own chapel in which he regularly performs sermons for the citizens. During the Whisperer War, Gabriel is on lookout at the guard tower and notices the Whisperers along with a large herd of walkers. He tries to get off the tower to warn Alexandria but falls and breaks his leg. While Gabriel is calling out for help, Beta, the leader of the Whisperers, stabs and kills him.

Gabriel first appears in the season 5 episode "Strangers". He is heard screaming for help, and when Rick's group arrives, they find him trapped on top of a boulder with three walkers surrounding him. They quickly kill the walkers and Gabriel comes down, thanking them after vomiting. After being searched and answering Rick's questions, he tells them that he has a church nearby, and he leads them back to it. He insists that he is alone, and has been ever since the outbreak started, surviving off of food from the nearest town. When he tells them that he hasn't searched the local food bank, due to it being overrun, he is forced on a supply run to the food bank with Rick, Michonne, Bob, and Sasha. During the run, he panics when he recognizes one of the walkers in the flooded basement, and is nearly killed before Rick saves him. Rick makes it immediately clear that he does not trust Gabriel, although Carl believes that Rick is being too tough on the priest. Rick's suspicions increase when Gabriel admits to having "sinned" in the past, and Carl discovers scratch marks on the outside of the church's walls, along with the phrase "You'll burn for this" scratched into the wood. In the episode "Four Walls and a Roof", when Sasha accuses Gabriel of being behind the disappearances of Bob, Carol, and Daryl, Rick grabs Gabriel and demands that he confess what he did. Breaking down sobbing, Gabriel reveals that in the immediate aftermath of the outbreak, he locked his church's doors and windows and refused to let anyone in, even members of his own congregation as they were torn apart by the walkers. He buried their bones outside the church grounds, but nonetheless believes that he is damned to hell for what he did and begs Rick to kill him if he is. Gabriel is clearly appalled at the group's use of violence when they slaughter all six of the Terminus survivors inside his church. In the episode "Crossed", despite his distaste of the use of weapons, Carl convinces Gabriel to choose a weapon that Carl will teach him how to use. After some reluctance, he chooses a machete. However, it is revealed that he is actually using the machete to pry open the floorboards of his office so that he can escape using a crawlspace beneath the church. In the mid-season finale "Coda", Gabriel heads to the elementary school where the late Bob said he was taken by the Hunters when they ate his leg. After finding the Hunters' camp, including Bob's burned leg and Mary's Bible, he is thoroughly horrified at what the world around him has become. At that moment, the herd of walkers that was trapped inside the school finally breaks through the glass doors and begins pursuing him. He runs back to the church, only to lead the walker horde right back to the church as well, thus rendering the church no longer safe when the walkers break through the door. However, Abraham and his group return blocking the walkers off by smashing the entrance with a firetruck. Gabriel is seen among Abraham's group when they arrive in Atlanta, in time to see Daryl carrying Beth's lifeless body.