Amardeep Kaleka will never forget the moment when his father laid on the ground and prayed.

Satwant Singh Kaleka had been shot five times while wresting a gunman in a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. His turban was knocked off, and two kids and a priest crawled up beside him. Together, they prayed.

Amardeep Kaleka went to the temple and stared at that spot.

His father did not survive. He died along with five others.

"It felt like he was praying and putting something into the zeitgeist and imprinting it," he told CNN. His son hoped it would lead to a changing tide on gun violence.

As he began his meditation that day, Amardeep made a vow: He would do whatever he could to ensure nobody ever went through what his family had.

"It just came over me that you can't stay silent," he said. "You can't continue to allow violence like this to happen haphazardly at a church, at a school, any place.

That was August 2012.

Four months later, 20 children and six adults were gunned down in Newtown, Connecticut.

That school massacre has led many people, including Kaleka, 33, to question where we go from here as a country. Or if we will ever get there at all.

It led him to stand up at a gathering here on Thursday, CNN's "Guns Under Fire: An AC360º Town Hall Special," and ask a panel of advocates with polar opposite views if they could agree on anything. If there was actually any middle ground.

"After meeting with so many senators, so many gun proponents and gun control advocates, it seems like they're recycling the same jargon all the time," he said, explaining his reason for the question. "So I was just hoping, let's get to the common ground."

The panel included National Rifle Association board members, the president of the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence, law enforcement representatives and other participants voicing viewpoints across the spectrum.

Was there a consensus?

Sort of.

"There's a lot of common ground," Sandra Froman, a member of the NRA board of directors and a former president of the group, said at the town hall. "We don't want people who are insane to have guns, we don't want terrorists to have guns. Part of this national dialogue is coming together."

So everyone agreed: Something has to happen. The devil is in the details.

"I think the common ground clearly exists from a policy standpoint when talking about background checks," said Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence.

But it isn't that simple. It never is when it comes to gun control.

"The NRA is not against background checks," Froman said. "We support making sure they are enforced. We're not supporting more background checks of law-abiding citizens."

Her remarks signaled a slight change in the NRA's stance.

In a heated back and forth, the two debated whether it was truly harmful to force everyone who wants to purchase a gun -- whether at a gun store, a gun show, or in a private sale -- to go through a background check.

Froman talked about how the current background check system was broken, noting that an "instant check" in Colorado can actually take about 10 days.

"We have to get it working before we add any more checks," she said, noting that requiring everyone to undergo a check would take a lot of resources and money.

Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey spoke from his experience, saying whatever it took, whatever the price tag, it would be worth it to stem the violence.