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Reverend Sharon Dittmar
Last night I sat down to read the Sunday New York Times from the
week before. There on the front page were stories about increased executions
in China, trouble in Israel, President Bush's mediocre communication style.
I hungrily read these articles, remnants from our past, when things were
more normal, when we thought we knew what was going on. As serious as the
topics were, they almost seemed like toys from my childhood, when the world
was easier, brighter, before Tuesday, September 11 at 8:48 A.M., when the
first of four hijacked airplane hit 1 World Trade Center. After everything
we have been through in all our many lives and generations, Tuesday,
September 11, 2001 still seems like the end of innocence.
The week's events are slowly beginning to take their cumulative emotional
toll. After the shock and denial we are beginning to struggle with survivors
guilt, why not me? Why wasn't it my airplane, my office building? We are
feeling early ripples of post-traumatic stress, stunned by replayed events
that challenge our sense of safety and identity. We have bad dreams and
constantly check on our children in the night. For some the events of the
past week have brought back previous traumas and losses. We lose our
tempers, anxiety runs high. We want to lash out.
I want to validate the variety of thoughts and feelings, often conflicted
within ourselves, that we bring into the sanctuary this morning. Our anger
is real. Our pain is real. Our fear is real. As human beings, we are
overwhelmed by the losses witnessed and felt since Tuesday.
However, our choices are also real. In the chaos, many of us have
forgotten that we still have the most powerful choice of all, the choice of
how to respond. Yes, it is a time of pain and fear, but we can bring
patience, cooperation, reflection, and compassion to our relationships,
decisions, and lives.
Many of us have answered this call. We have given blood, money, water,
T-shirts, sent cards, helped friends and neighbors stuck in airports out of
town. We have taken on the Herculean task of calmly, and honestly answering
our children's questions at levels appropriate to their ages.
We have struggled, and will continue to struggle, against our own fear,
to see our Arab American neighbors as unique individuals and human beings.
Someone I worry about and pray for the most these days is a treasured
acquaintance who has given me a gift in my life that I can only pass on,
never repay. This man is an Arab American, and quite ironically, a
Christian, which is why he had to leave the country of his birth. My prayer
is that when people meet him they will see the human being I have come to
respect and treasure, not an inhuman tool for their hatred. I know that many
of you share similar concerns for Arab Americans. The temptations are great,
but we cannot become the terrorists we hate. These are not easy times, but
they are not helpless times. We have work to do, patience to share, hope to
give.
My favorite spokesperson this week has been New York City Mayor Rudolph
Giuliani. With his matter-of-factness, commitment, hard edged compassion,
and tireless energy, Mayor Giuliani has risen to the challenge and shown us
how to respond. In a recent interview he said, "Go out to eat, go to
restaurants, go back to life. Have confidence in yourself and the city." He
has also been sensitive towards the renewed concerns of Arab Americans, and
in that marvelous New York way, warned price gougers of any sort that they
would be prosecuted.
Life as usual seems almost impossible. Now we barely know how or when to
laugh, dance, listen to rock n' roll music, or go to the theatre. Each of us
will find our way back to these human responses and needs in our own way and
in our own time, but Mayor Giuliani reminds us that we must return, sooner
rather than later.
Yes, we need a national day of prayer and remembrance. Yes, cancel
college and professional sports events for this week. Yes, take the day off
from work and hold your children tight, but don't stop living. The victims
and survivor families of this tragedy call us to honor and remember them
always, to create a safer and better world after them, and they call us to
live. We must live in order to carry forward the very values they sacrificed
their lives for, democracy, civil rights, modernity, and pluralism.
The World Trade Center, Pentagon, and perhaps the White House, were the
physical and symbolic targets on Tuesday. However, the more significant
target was the American and Western way of life. We have yet to determine
with utter certainty who initiated these terrorist attacks, but we know one
thing, these attacks were born from hatred fostered in extreme Islamic
fundamentalism.
My intended sermon for this morning was on fundamentalism. Given the
events of the week, that sermon has been moved to October 7th, and I hope
you will come back to learn and struggle with the factors that have led to
the popularization of fundamentalism in almost all major world religions.
Fundamentalism has misused religion as a platform for its agenda, whether
that religion is Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, or Judaism,. The agenda of
fundamentalism is to turn back the wheels of modernity, and to prove the
necessity of such a turn with shocking acts. Fundamentalism is not
interested in justice.
Fundamentalism thrives in people and communities who are scared of
change. Fundamentalists are not satisfied to struggle with their fears, nor
to isolate themselves from the larger society with which they disagree.
Instead, fundamentalists are determined to make the rest of society conform
to their standards, values, and principles. If this feels controlling,
that's because it is controlling. Control is what fundamentalists hope to
achieve. One of the most offensive qualities about fundamentalism is its
disregard for democracy, civil liberties, and pluralism.
Here in America fundamentalism has tied itself to a conservative,
traditional, mostly Protestant, Christianity (or more accurately, American
fundamentalists have shackled Christianity to their purposes).
Fundamentalist Christian groups and individuals have bombed abortion clinics
and published statements indicating that AIDS is God's punishment for
homosexuality. Just this week I read that Reverend Jerry Falwell explained
the bombing of the World Trade Center and Pentagon as the results of
Americans turning away from God.
These acts and statements are shocking, and that is their purpose.
Fundamentalists want everyone to turn back because they themselves are
afraid of change, and they will go so far as to disregard the sanctity of
human life to achieve their purpose. Timothy McVeigh is another example of
fundamentalism. His words said he was upset with the interference of the
United States government. His actions showed that he wanted the entire
society to change in order to appease his fear, and he was willing to kill
to meet his need.
I have been disappointed this week that several people have equated
specific United States actions with these terrorist attacks; "These attacks
happened because…" I do not intend to be in the business of justifying
terrorist actions. They are too narcissistic and offensive and there is no
excuse. I am extremely frustrated with race relations in Cincinnati. I
boycotted the Taste of Cincinnati. I did not bomb the Taste of Cincinnati.
The most intelligent commentator I have heard on the general causes of
terrorism said, "This is a hydra. We cannot cut off the head without
addressing the many legs." There is no justification for terrorism. At the
same time there are economic, political, military, and religious situations
that either encourage or discourage terrorists. If the world plans to
checkmate terrorism, we will need to be thoughtful, patient, and crafty. We
will need to rely on diplomacy, intelligence, economic stabilization, power
sharing, and international collaboration, as well as military force.
There are many legs to this. Islam is in for a struggle. Can this great
religion free itself from the controlling shackles of fundamentalism that,
in certain areas, threaten to overwhelm its inherent goodness and meaning?
Countries like Syria, Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan will be forced into
difficult choices. Not just the United States, but the world is beginning to
say that complicity includes harboring terrorists. Where do these countries
stand on the issue of terrorism?
America itself is in for quite a challenge. The terrorists who
perpetrated these attacks would like nothing better than to see the erosion
of our democracy, civil rights, and pluralism. Every hate crime, every
threatening telephone call or situation of harassment against an Arab-
American is another victory for terrorism and the forces of control and
hate. What better way to bring us down but by our own inability to embody
the values we espouse? America faces a serious civic challenge. An editorial
in the New York Times printed the day after the attack read, this is
a "sad and tragic reminder that living in a free society has a price. The
difficult question we must now ask ourselves is whether we are still willing
to pay that price."
In that same issue another columnist noted "By hijacking civilian
airliners and riding them into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, [the
terrorists] used the very accessibility of an open society to wound that
society." As a fuller story has developed, we feel great rage, pain, and
fear that these terrorists lived, worked, trained, and sent their children
to school here, in America. Once again, the tendency is to lash out with
laws and attacks against Arab Americans, Muslims, or immigrants. Once again,
I tell you, this would be a victory for the terrorists.
Our country has long struggled and prided itself in our democracy and
civil liberties, which have led to a stunning pluralism. The victims of
these attacks call for us to cherish and strengthen the qualities that make
our nation great, not for thoughtless revenge. To the forces of hate &
control, we must show love and continued freedom. Israel has faced these
challenges for half a century, and we have seen their pain, triumphs, and
failures. Now it is our turn.
On Friday, many of us took time to watch the service of prayer and
remembrance held at the National Cathedral in Washington D. C. The music was
transcendent, particularly Denise Graves singing "America the Beautiful".
For many of us this was a moment when we looked across our great land and
wept. The early prayers by Muslim and Jewish leaders provided hope and
meaning. With all due respect, my greatest disappointment was the sermon
delivered by the Reverend Billy Graham.
Rev. Graham called for this to be a time of spiritual renewal. Evangelism
was not the tone needed in this great pluralistic democracy on Friday. It
may be a time for a spiritual renewal, but more importantly, it is a time
for civic renewal. I kept waiting for Reverend Graham to call us out as
citizens of a great nation, rather than as Christians, leaving millions of
non-Christians outside the gates. In fact, just last night I spoke to my
sister who lives in the Netherlands. According to her, Europeans are
becoming concerned that America is wrapping Christianity into nationalism in
order to promote our own kind of religious war.
Sometimes I wonder if I was the only one paying attention in my high
school history class. Christianity, a great religion, has influenced
America, but Christianity hasn't made America great. This is what I wanted
Reverend Graham to say, and since he didn't, I will say it in his place:
Democracy has made us great. The Constitution of the United States has made
us great. The Bill of Rights has made us great. We are neither a monarchy
nor a theocracy. Our separation of church and state, enabling all faiths and
cultures to struggle for a place and a voice, is what has made us great, and
this is what we must work for, this is what we must hope for, and this is
what we must fight for. This is what the stars and stripes means to me. As
long as we sustain this power, we are powerful. As long as we sustain this
power, we are not helpless; we are helpful.
Moreover, we are not alone. The outpouring of support from the world has
given many of us great comfort. By Wednesday morning, the government of Cuba
expressed its "pain" and "solidarity" with the United States. Remarkable
words, really, from Cuba, and sincere. Two nights ago I saw firefighters
from Budapest lined up in their uniforms next to their trucks in honor of
New York City firefighters, police, and volunteers who have worked so hard,
and with such great loss, to rescue those who are trapped and to dig out the
rubble. I also watched the changing of the guard several nights ago at
Buckingham palace. The guard played the Star Spangled Banner, while the
crowd held their hands over their hearts as we do, carried American flags,
and wept.
We have much to do. We are called to moderate our anxiety and spirit of
vengeance. We are each called to carry forth the vision and values of this
great nation, democracy, civil rights, and pluralism. We are called to help
our sister and brothers in need. Our blood, water, money, thoughts and
prayers do make a difference. We are called to have hope and courage.
Last Thursday, Mayor Giuliani stopped to visit a hospitalized
firefighter, and asked him what it was like on the front lines. The man
replied, "I had to do it. I am a New Yorker." We too have to dig through our
rubble of fear, pain, and cracked dreams, because we are Americans, and this
nation and world, needs us. May it always be so.
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