St. Peter's Church

Sermons
St. Peter's Episcopal Church

Sermons

Sermon preached by The Reverend Eric Kimball Hinds at Saint Peter's Church, Mountain Lakes, New Jersey. Lessons: Exodus 32:1,7-14; Psalm 51:1-11; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10.

Sharing the Pain of 9/11
Your arm flails in the dark, the mind not yet fully connected as you grope for the sleep button. Finally, showered and dressed, you cradle a cup of coffee to coax the rest of your mind and body to wakefulness. On automatic you move through the morning routine as the city of Boston begins to wake up. The activity level steadily increases and you greet each customer with a smile and send them on their way. Especially, as the hour nears you are used to the harried commuter, behind schedule, demanding your full attention, asking you to hurry, as if the world revolves around their need to catch this flight. With a few deft moves you produce the flight tickets and you are on to the next customer.

The normal pace of Tuesday morning was shattered by the news of the plane crash into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. The frantic pace of rush hour was violently interrupted as people were frozen in their tracks and earth itself seemed to stop dead. This news was followed by a crash directed into the other twin tower; a direct hit on the Pentagon, and the plane crash in Pennsylvania — they all unfolded with the eyes and ears of the world tuned in helpless to stop the horror of terrorism directed against the U.S..

As information began to surface at some point it dawned upon the ticket agent in Boston that those seven tickets were delivered to the hands of the terrorists who would use the planes as missiles of destruction. And in a world that has become accustomed to the notion of only six degrees of separation between any two individuals on the planet. A ticket agent found that the walls of separation tumbled and an uninvited connection was made bringing the terror of the days events into sharp focus with a personal experience.

Adding to the horror of watching this week's traumatic events unfold there are for each of us personal connections and stories — that like the ticket agents transaction — compound and magnify our painful experience of this event. The shock of these events is numbing. The pain of loss is overwhelming. And the grief and anger is still very much with us. In such times it is a real blessing that we gather as a community of faith for as I mentioned at the Monday night prayer service the grief of these events is too much for any of us to bear alone. Our prayers and solidarity with all those who have lost loved ones or faced any adversity provides both comfort and strength. Perhaps especially in the wake of such events it is clear that we gather here because we need to. We come to celebrate the blessings of our lives, but also to seek comfort from our pain and suffering for the promise of the Gospel is that love — God's love does swallow up and prevail over evil.

Like it or not the consequences of Tuesday's terrorist attacks affects us at many levels. At the National Level the call for a swift and forceful response to this act of terror gives voice to the inflicted pain and anguish. By all reasonable means of measure this attack qualifies as an act of war and yet with no group or country claiming for the attack we are left rather like the person at the center of blind man's bluff — casting about in the darkness attempting to identify the location of one's tormentors. Some Americans have already clamored that we should bomb Afghanistan (as the country believed to be harboring Osama bin Laden) back to the stone age. To which one reporter responded "(people) ought to know that Afghanistan does not have so far to go. It is a post-apocalyptic place of felled cities, parched land and a downtrodden people."

Giving a response with more depth Anthony Lewis cautions "Suppose there were Quick strikes by U.S. aircraft on targets in Afghanistan, made to show that we mean business. The result would likely be to kill many impoverished Afghan civilians and few if any terrorists. The danger is that such military action would trigger the Law of Unintended Consequences." And Lewis goes on to point out how Afghanistan is a prime example. He recollects: "When the Soviet Union invaded there in 1979, (we) the U.S armed Islamic forces to resist (and) the country has ended in the hands of anti-Western Islamic extremists. The danger in the current situation is that hasty, ill-targeted military action could arouse anti-Western sentiments right across the Middle East."

The urge to strike back — to punish and to inflict damage so as to deter and destroy terrorism is a visceral response that will need to be tempered with critical thinking, experience and sound judgment. By its very nature terrorism is a vile tactic — abhorrent to God. It often defies easy detection, and frustrates swift and certain punishment, yet these facts should not turn us away from the difficult task of bringing everyone responsible for these acts to Justice.

In such a task our zealous quest for Justice must be matched by our passion for adhering the rule of law and acting with moral integrity. Emotionally, far less satisfying and more difficult, but perhaps more important is the long term task of attempting to remove the pillars that support terrorism. Our careful attention given to the politics of the Middle East and to the rest of the world is essential if we are to have any success against terrorism in the long term.

One of the difficult aspects of this war against terrorism is that it is not fundamentally a war of nation against nation or religion against religion. It would indeed be a tragic mistake for instance to label this as a conflict between Christianity and Islam. We must be clear that these attacks are being waged by factions of groups that veer towards extreme fundamentalism. For our Nation and communities which embrace and are built upon diversity this is an important point. We need to condemn the recent out breaks of violence against Arab Americans or any other group that are based merely upon fear and uninformed suspicion and prejudice.

Many have seen the disturbing video of some Palestinians rejoicing in the aftermath of the attacks on the U.S. but it is important to remember that those scenes do not tell the whole story. Yesterday's New York Times for example, shows a picture of Palestinian children in Hebron, wearing New York City T-shirts, with their heads bowed in solemn prayer representing many others who demonstrated their support for the U.S. In our own communities we need to find ways to continue to support one another and to affirm the presence of the healing grace of God moving in our midst.

On Tuesday morning, at about 10:30, I called Father Pat at Saint Catherine's to talk about two things. The first was to see if each of the churches could toll their bells at noontime which we were able to arrange. The second was to talk about organizing a prayer service for the entire community. With attendance at Ecumenical events not having the greatest history we convinced ourselves that even if only 25-50 people showed up — this was important and worth doing. I agreed to call Larry at the Community Church and Father Pat agreed to call Mark at King of Kings. I called Vada to get our phone tree ready and little did Jean know that one of her jobs as parish secretary would be to help me make a sign to put down on the boulevard announcing the evening service. It was overwhelming to say the least to see approximately 700 people gather for that prayer service. In the midst of grief and loss it was a beautiful symbol of unity, faith and love.

After some deliberation by Administrators, the schools in town here decided not to close but to remain open. The principal of Briarcliff said afterward that she agonized over that decision as was second guessing herself, until that Wednesday, when in the course of the day about 30 children came up to thank her for having school and not canceling classes. It seems that these kids had an innate sense that they needed one another to get through this crisis.

I began my sermon by talking about degrees of separation with the implicit notion that distance from people and events might make tragedy easier to bear. I actually think that the message and witness of the Gospel is quite the opposite. In this morning's Gospel, Jesus is singled out and held in disdain because he welcomes sinners to his table and then shares a meal with them. In other words, Jesus starts by engaging people as they are imperfect and human and then he begins to establish closer relationships. It is in such a network of welcoming, acceptance and support that a true community can be built.

For any community of faith bearing one another's burdens is not easy, yet the promise of the Gospel is that in sharing God's love we will find that the beginnings of the kingdom of God are established in our midst, and we will discover our true and fullest identity in relationship to love that we venture to share with one another.