September 11, 2026 is the 25th anniversary of 9/11/2001. Back in the 1980s over time I worked at two different companies located in the World Trade Center. When 2001 happened I was an ordained pastor in Upstate New York. That church and that town was 4 plus hours north and west of NYC. Having worked in the Trade Center, it goes without saying I was not only familiar with the buildings and the neighborhood. I had and still have deep feelings about it. I never re-post a sermon. On this anniversary I am making an exception. The Sunday after this tragedy I was in the pulpit. Below is the meditation I offered on that day. I have not changed what I wrote then. It is my hope that it spoke to my congregation at that time. It is my hope that it might speak to us today.

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09/16/2001 ~ Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost ~ Lectionary Readings: Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Psalm 14 or Exodus 32:7-14; Psalm 51:1-10; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10; Note: since the 15th chapter of Luke is a literary unit, the whole chapter was read. This Sunday was the Sunday after the terrorist attack on Washington and New York.

The Ultimate Concern

In Luke’s Gospel the son who has stayed at home says to his father, “…‘Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends.’”— Luke 15:29.

Where were you when it happened? Were you at work? At home? On the road? Were you alone? With someone? Did someone call and tell you to turn on the televison or radio?

Or were you out of touch, fishing or hiking and did not find out about the terrorism until many hours after it happened? Just like Pearl Harbor or the Challenger disaster, we all will long remember where we were or in whose company we found ourselves. (Slight pause.)

I’m sure you’ve heard this said by others, but it seems to have credence. At 8:48 on Tuesday morning, life, as we know it, changed forever. The way we live our lives will never be the same for our country or the world. This is because, as Secretary of State Powell eloquently stated, the actions Tuesday were not merely or only an attack on this country. It was an attack on civilization… all civilization.

And, as Shimon Peres noted, this is not a clash between civilizations— for instance: the Muslim world versus the Christian, Hindu, Buddhist and Jewish worlds. The is a clash within each of these structures among those who condone unacceptable behavior toward other people and those who don’t condone it.

We all know there are Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and Jews who believe, as Christians do, that we are accountable, in God’s dominion, for responsible behavior toward all people, so to label any group as liable would be emotionally immature. Therefore, let us act in an emotionally mature fashion about this and abandon not anger but inappropriate anger.

It would also be wise for us to remember what President Lincoln said of the South during the Civil War: “They pray to the same God.” No one needs to go to war with the millions of Muslims who pray to the same God we do. To be theologically clear: we may have different means of expression and even understandings, but God is God is God. [1]

There are, of course, some individuals in each of these groups, Christians included, Americans included, who are nihilists. A dictionary definition says nihilists are people who deny there is any sound basis for knowledge or truth as perceived by most of humanity. Hence, nihilists are individuals who see only their own, personal truth, nothing else. Because any individualistic truth eventually turns virulent since it is inbred. These are people who believe only self-proclaimed insight matters.

There’s an eventual consequence to inbred truth: it leads to a belief that one is not to be held responsible for behavior towards others. Therefore anything goes. It’s little wonder such a position culminates in believing one’s own law and own understanding of the law reigns supreme. This produces a result which says the ends justify the means.

Christianity and all the great world religions, when well understood, have at their core a history which rejects nihilism, rejects ignorance, rejects insular judgments, rejects legalism, rejects the insularity found when one surrenders to an impulse which says cruelty to others is acceptable behavior. Indeed, the great world religions often use metaphors, verbal equations which state that God is light or knowledge or truth.

None of these metaphors can be construed to suggest God somehow condones harboring hate. None of the metaphors even suggest that God is law. The most common metaphor used says God is love. (Slight pause.)

Now, I’ll bet a few of you are sitting there saying, well Joe, you’ve presented a fine intellectual analysis of what’s gone on here, but I need an emotional place on which to hang my hat. I need to emotionally grapple with what’s happened. (Slight pause.) Yes, I agree. And so do I. And so do millions and millions of other people.

But grappling with this situation emotionally is not going to happen just yet. It’s too soon, too raw. That’s going to take months, perhaps even years. There will be a long process in just identifying our own emotions, a long process grieving for ourselves and for others.

And I can even tell you what it will be like when we’ve all come to the point where we have all actually succeeded in emotionally grappling with the terror of last Tuesday. (Slight pause.) This will be hard, but we will have succeeded in emotionally grappling with the terror of last Tuesday when we’ve finally managed to forgive those who perpetrated this horror. So let us not, ourselves, turn toward a vision of insularity which can lead to such sure destructiveness. (Slight pause.)

And in Luke’s Gospel the son who has stayed at home says to his father, “…‘Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends.’” (Slight pause.)

In the modern era we seem to have forgotten something. Religion does not offer information about facts. Religion speaks about meaning. Hence, if we are religious, attempting to explore how many days it took God to create the world is not a valid position. Delving into ‘why’ God created the world is.

When those who practice religion defend the great symbols of religion, symbols such as creation, as fact and not symbol, they merely surrender any power such symbols might have to move us emotionally. Symbols offer dimension, depth, meaning and address our emotional lives. Facts are strangely one dimensional.

Indeed a classic definition says religion asks the question “What is our ultimate concern?” If truth be told, before Tuesday in the late 20th and early 21st century we, humanity, not only Americans, had all kinds of ultimate concerns which mostly ignored meaning, dimension and depth.

After all, the classic question of our age, world wide, is not ‘what is something worth, that is what is the depth and dimension of its value,’ but ‘what does it cost?’ We justify everything by what it cost, not by its meaning.

Indeed, that may have been a mistake made by the perpetrators of Tuesday’s attack. They seem to have thought, because they saw us asking about cost rather than value, we would ask what was the loss in terms of cost, when our response has been to concentrate on asking what this meant in human terms, in terms of dimension and depth of the loss. We realized our spirit assaulted.

Asking what something cost and not asking what is something means may seem like a modern malady at first. This is, in many ways, the problem of the son who stayed at home. He is just as lost, if not even more lost, than his prodigal brother. His brother, in the end, understood something about what life is worth, the meaning of life, as opposed to what life cost.

Despite being what many might deem the ‘faithful son,’ the one who stayed and worked, asks why he has never been given ‘even a young goat?’ In so doing he is asking ‘what’s the cost?’ (Slight pause.)

It seems to me that last Tuesday has the potential, if we allow it, to ask ourselves questions about depth, dimension and spirit, questions about what our ultimate concern might really be. Is our ultimate concern cost or is our ultimate concern meaning?

Is our ultimate concern the God of light and hope and justice and peace and knowledge and freedom and truth? Or is our ultimate concern wrapped up in a nihilism of asking what things cost? Is our ultimate concern wrapped up in seeking our own, individual, inbred, virulent truth in which the ends justify the means? (Pause.)

Who were you with last Tuesday? (Pause.) Were you with someone who you did not care for but someone who God called you to love deeply? Or were you with someone you loved, but even so, you still could not begin to process the unfolding events?

Did you find yourself helping someone else as you watched in horror together? Indeed, was that person you were with someone you did not like or was it someone you loved. Or did that even matter, as you recognized your common humanity? How did you emotionally grapple with recognizing your common humanity? (Pause.)

Where were you last Tuesday? At what place did your spirit find itself? What was your ultimate concern? Were you seeking depth, dimension? Were you concerned with the Spirit of God? Was your life centered on the God of hope, justice, peace, freedom, truth and knowledge, the God of love who constantly invites us out of darkness and into the light? Amen.

09/16/2001
United Church of Christ, Norwich, NY

END PIECE – It is the practice of the Pastor to speak after the Closing Hymn, but before the Benediction. This is an précis of what was said: Many of you have heard these words. They are from the memorial service of the United Church of Christ. ‘Friends, we gather here in the protective shelter of God’s healing love. We are free to pour out our grief, release our anger, face our emptiness, and know that God cares. We gather here as God’s people, conscious of others who have died and of the frailty of our own existence on earth. We come to comfort and to support one another in our common loss. We gather to hear God’s word of hope that can drive away our despair and move us to offer God our praise.’ As we gather here each Sunday it is well to remember that, as Christians, we believe the protective shelter of God’s care, God’s healing love is available to all people.”

BENEDICTION: O God, you have bound us together in a common life. Help us, in the midst of our striving for justice and truth, to confront one another in love, and to work together with mutual patience, acceptance and respect. Send us out, sure in Your grace and Your peace with surpasses understanding, to live faithfully. Amen.

[1] The two previous paragraphs are adapted from an article by Thomas L. Friedman in the NY Times – Smoking or Non-smoking? – 09/14/2001.