wfn.org | Presbyterians remember Sept. 11

[PCUSA NEWS <PCUSA.NEWS@ecunet.org>]

Note #7419 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

11-September-2002
02345

Presbyterians remember Sept. 11 

Prayer service marks anniversary of horrific terror attacks

by Evan Silverstein

LOUISVILLE - Presbyterians who work at the national headquarters of the
Presbyterian Church (USA) paused Wednesday to remember the unthinkable events
of a year ago with reflection, recitations of the victims' names, and most of
all, with prayer.

More than 200 staff members and church leaders crammed into the chapel at the
Presbyterian Center for a 60-minute, standing-room-only prayer service to
remember the victims of the terrorist attacks on New York City and
Washington, DC, and the jetliner crash in western Pennsylvania, last Sept.
11. 

"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble," said the
Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, stated clerk of the General Assembly of the
PC(USA), reading responsively from Psalm 46.

A bell was tolled twice for the nearly 3,000 people who died when suicidal
terrorists hijacked commercial planes and slammed them into the World Trade
Center, the Pentagon and a rural field in Pennsylvania. 

Some participants wept. Others embraced.

Kirkpatrick recalled a service in New York City Presbytery shortly after the
attacks in which a passage from Romans 8 was recited, attesting that
persecution, famine and other threats can "never separate us from the love"
of God and Christ.

"In life or death we belong to God," he said during A Service of Prayer on
the Anniversary of Sept. 11.  "It is that comment and that assurance ...
through which God calls us today to come together to worship, to be in
prayer, support one another and seek God's healing."

Joining Kirkpatrick in addressing the group were Amal Marks, associate for
Middle Eastern Ministries (U.S.A) in the National Ministries Division; John
Detterick, executive director of the General Assembly Council; the Rev.
Victor Makari, Middle East coordinator for the denomination's Worldwide
Ministries Division; the Rev. Vernon Broyles, associate director for social
justice in the National Ministries Division; and Angela Lucear, a senior
administrative assistant in the Office of General Assembly.   

Also on hand were Andreas D'Souza, a Christian, and Imat Mehdi, a Muslim,
both from India, who were in Louisville in connection with the Interfaith
Listening Project created by the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program and the
PC(USA)'s Interfaith Relations Office to foster Christian-Muslim dialogue. 

Prayers of remembrance were offered for the victims, their families and loved
ones, emergency response officials who were killed, as well as the nations
and churches that lost members in the Sept. 11 attacks or to other acts of
violence around the world. Among the names recited were those of the 19
hijackers.

The Rev. Martha Moore-Keish, associate for worship in the Office of Theology
and Worship, said many of the victims no doubt died while calling on Christ,
who "stretched out your hands to embrace the suffering of the world on the
hard wood of the cross." She continued, "Draw near to us now and hear our
prayers as we remember all those who lost their lives in the tragedy of last
Sept. 11."

The solemn gathering also featured other readings from scripture and hymns
including God of Our Life and Great Is They Faithfulness. It was intended to
commemorate all the victims of suffering around the world, not just those of
Sept. 11.

"What we wanted to do was both remember the tragedy of Sept. 11 and do
something that proclaimed the God that we believe in, and also to put it in
the context of the whole world in which there's pain and suffering," said the
Rev. Charles Wiley, association for theology in the denomination's Office of
Theology and Worship, which planned the prayer service.

"We remembered other nations ... so it wasn't just a focus on us and our
loss."
------------------------------------------
Send your response to this article to pcusa.news@pcusa.org

------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send an 'unsubscribe' request to

pcusanews-request@halak.pcusa.org