9/11-- 12 years later

In some ways it's hard to believe that 12 years have passed since that fateful 9/11.

In other ways, it's very clear.  I picked up my son John from grade school on that day.  The school had not told the students anything, thinking it best for parents to take on that job.  I was grateful.  John was only 11 at that time but the stunned look on his face communicated that he understood quite clearly the horror of what had happened.  Now he's in graduate school in London.  Funny how the aging of our children confirms for us the passage of time.

I don't want to see any replays any more.  I don't want to the see the towers collapsing again.  It's just too painful.

Several weeks after 9/11 there was a mysterious plane crash in New York.  I was in the waiting room of a doctor's office at the University of Michigan Health Center.  A number of people were gathered around, glued to the TV, wondering if this had been another terrorist attack.  My daughter Mary, only 6 quietly cried as she looked at the TV and I realized she had seen the 9/11 replays way too many times.

A woman from the registration desk had seen Mary's reaction and came walking over to her.  She leaned down and quietly said directly to Mary, "Would you like to watch Sesame Street?"  Mary nodded through her tears.  That woman walked right over to the TV and changed the channel to Sesame Street.   She glanced back at us and I silently mouthed "Thank you."  She smiled, giving not a glance to the adults in the room and went back to her desk.  I will always be grateful to her.

9/11 was an awful day.  The most powerful country in the world had been brought down with a couple of box-cutters.  So many people died, so many died trying to help.

That there were people so full of hate, so lacking in any kind of rational conscience, was horrifying.

May they rest in peace, Lord.  You have told us to pray for our enemies and so I do.  But I pray too that you would open the eyes of all those who would kill innocent people, all those who hate.  Please protect this country, Lord, from all those who wish us harm.  You, who have loved our country from the start, please do not abandon us to the forces of evil.  Please protect us.

Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of the Americas, pray for us!!!