These remarks were read by Jay Gaskill at a
Memorial on
A Meditation
By
Jay B. Gaskill
Today we are called to remember the events of 9-11 while
still in the shadow of a recent natural disaster, with its fresh wounds and
recriminations. But all crises carry messages that we are meant to hear—but some
messages are clearer than others. Today, four years later, we recall a terrible
Tuesday in
Robyn
and I had flown to
If
you awoke on the West Coast Tuesday morning, you might have been greeted by a
version of this account from ABC News:
September 11 – In a horrific sequence of terrorist violence, four
In
The
details – even the bare timeline – are chilling.
[]
At 8:45 AM Eastern Time, American Airlines Flight 11, a 767 from Boston to LA
with 81 passengers, 9 flight attendants and 2 pilots, is hijacked and flies
into the North Tower of the WTC, becoming a huge fireball.
[]
At 9:03 a second 767 out of Boston with 56 passengers, 2 pilots and 7 flight
attendants smashes into the South Tower and explodes.
[]
By
[]
[]
[]
10:10: United flight 93, a 757 from Newark to San Francisco, having changed
course, crashes in Pennsylvania with 38 passengers and 7 crew.
[]
[]
[]
[]
Mayor Giuliani evacuates Manhattan South of Canal Street. The Mayor and evacuees walk out.
[]
And the messages?
There
were certain phone messages that morning -- from passengers aboard flight 93 before
it dived into a
In
moments of extremis, God is always somewhere in the mix: Divine messages are threaded
in the warp and the woof of crisis and the Divine presence is embedded in the
suffering, the heroism and hope.
I wrote
my children on September 15th by email from
When
I opened my eyes in the dim room Tuesday morning, Robyn was still asleep. I
quietly slipped out of bed, went to the desk chair and tapped on a
keyboard. Seconds later, I was staring
at an odd color image. An airliner had been captured mid-collision, partly
inserted in the side of a skyscraper. It was an absurdly tiny picture, not more
than two inches on my screen; it framed the last horrific moment when most of
that airline’s passengers were still alive.
“My
God,” I said, waking Robyn. At that moment, about
Minutes
later, we were down in the main apartment, staring at the large screen. When it
sank into my consciousness that a second airliner had struck the remaining
tower, I could feel the context shifting under me like some tectonic plate. People
had done this: on purpose. We were in
a different world.
Nathan’s
little family was busy with mundane morning necessities, the bathroom and the
coffee, and Robyn, was out – wisely – trying to find a working ATM. Then Nathan
called out: “It went down! The tower went down!”
We
gathered to stare at the screen, struggling to take in what had just
happened. When Robyn returned, she &
Nathan went outside, and saw the people walking down the middle of the street,
their shoes coated in fine white dust. When the second building went down, we would
smell the dust for days; it was sterile, faintly electric, the sharp scent of ash
forged in a crematorium. “Ash Tuesday” I thought. Ash Wednesday. Ash
Thursday…
On
9-11, at
The
lyrics proved impossible to sing all the way through without choking up,
especially the line—“for heroes proved in liberating strife, who more than self
their country loved and mercy more than life”. We wept. And we wept again at Sunday services at
As
we walked through
Wednesday,
as we wandered through Midtown, we stumbled onto holy ground. Across from St. Francis Church, a fire wagon,
Ladder Truck 24, was parked by its now cavernous, empty station. The truck was
covered in white powder, still piled high on the rear bumper. I walked around
and around that truck, staring in wonder at the tracings in the dust. Loving
fingers had left benedictions on every surface, words like “HONOR AND PRAISE TO N.Y.F.D.” and “WE OWE OUR LIVES TO YOU.”
The
American flag was draped across the ladder. Candles and photos adorned the hood
and grillwork of the truck. A large
black and white photo of a kind faced man leaned against the fire station
doorway. The station was empty; two solemn men stood watch. The picture was of a
fire department Chaplain, Mychal Judge.
As
we stayed on in
I
watched a solemn little girl sitting, carefully writing on the scroll with her crayons. There were many tears and many, many floating
holy spaces….
I
wrote this in my journal at the time:
“Evil
is real. It came to this city, near the
“Yet
Good is real. The last few days here have recharged my
belief in the human capacity for heroism and virtue under duress. It is an honor to be among the New
Yorkers. I now understand that evil is
like a descending night flare on a battlefield, exposing
the configuration of forces below. Its terrible
light clarifies the essence of things. In that actinic glare, all our differences
melt into insignificance because, after all, they are just different versions
of the good.”
Later,
when our plane finally roared down the runway at JFK, the images of the window candles,
the taped up photos of missing loved ones on the armory, on doorways, windows
and poles, the long paper scroll in Union Square, the Ladder Truck 24 shrine,
all played out in my mind. As I looked
out the window at the suddenly diminished
To
me it seemed so simple. We are sustained
in three deeply entwined relationships: our relationships with each other; our
relationships with our own futures; and our relationship to ultimate being, to the
God of all being. It is the ultimate
relationship that gives meaning and shape to the first two. Belief, I realized, is like water. If you let it freeze, something in you
dies. If you fail to hold it, something
in you withers. You keep drinking from it or you die in a desert of your own
making.
I
wrote my children that. I added that we are held up in ultimate relationship. So
I invited them to choose to believe: Believe that we are here to practice
integrity with humor and humility, and to experience the journey of life,
including all its pain and joy. Believe
that we are here to promote the Good, by respecting the integrity and favoring
the health of all conscious beings, starting with our own. Believe we are here
to recognize the reality and threatening nature of evil in an unfinished
universe and to oppose it with character, intelligence, and courage. Believe we
are brought here as children, and we are allowed to stay here to grow and
become wise children.
I
was changed by 9-11 because I saw a miracle happen when my fellow humans were caught
in the descending glare of evil. It was a general awakening. Within the huge diversity
of secular and religious perspectives that constitutes
We
Christians are called by our baptismal covenant to renounce the evil powers of
this world. As our airplane headed home, I knew with certainty that my optimism
about the human condition was well founded. We mortal humans were so designed
that evil’s appearance will continue to illuminate and call forth the good in
us.
When
we Anglicans say the Lord’s Prayer, we ask the Lord to “save us from the time
of trial.” In preparing for this Sunday, I came on a list of the firefighters
and police who charged into those buildings only to die. Many climbed 70 floors carrying 100 pounds of
gear. Reporting for duty that day and
responding to the call defines “time of trial.” They were called to a trial and
each of them answered the call with courage.
I
think of the passengers on flight 93,
I’m
sure that little of significance really happens on pure chance. Were we led by “accident” to the very
fire station where Mychal Judge had served as a Chaplain? I don’t believe that.
Father Mychal, a Franciscan friar, was dearly loved by all the firefighters who
knew him.
His
picture is on the first page of those lost in the line of duty. A happy 68 year old face smiles out at us, looking
natty in the NYFD’s dress uniform.
Father
Mychal was helping people get out of the first building before it collapsed. When
he learned that some firefighters were still trapped inside, he rushed back in.
There he found a gravely injured firefighter; he leaned over the fallen man to
administer the last rites, removing his own helmet.
Mychal
was killed at that instant by falling debris.
The
firefighters who knew him say that Father Mike would have wanted to be at the
gates to welcome all the brothers who would follow him to heaven that day.
Father
Mike’s white fire helmet was received by Pope John Paul on
May
God hold fast the souls of all who fell that day, especially those who answered
the call to duty.
And
may we never forget…
This piece was first posted on “The Policy Think Site”
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Copyright
© 2005 by Jay B. Gaskill
For permission to copy, publish, distribute or
print, contact:
Jay B. Gaskill, attorney at law, via e mail: response@jaygaskill.com