by Brett Manero
Today is the twenty-fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
It was a horrific and monumental day in history. From a historical perspective, it undoubtedly changed the United States and the world. Ten years after the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, after a decade of peace and tremendous prosperity during the 1990’s, so much was about to change.
I’m not going to write an article where I discuss where I was when I heard about it (so many like that have been written). But one memory I will mention.
In September of 2007, six years after the attacks, I found myself in southern Manhattan and at Ground Zero. I saw artwork from children that was placed on the walls nearby as a memorial to the victims. I was overcome with emotion, and began to weep slightly. Then, my father called, and as I answered I told him how emotional I was feeling. I could not understand how, when I was fifteen years old in 2001 when the attacks happened, I did not feel the raw pain of the attacks as much as when I was twenty-one years old, six years later. My father said something to me that I’ll never forget:
“The older you get, the more you value human life.”
That was it. Life is challenging and fragile. The more one lives it, the more one realizes this truth. One embraces the fragility and dignity of a single human life as one ages. This fragility was shown to the entire world in a unique way on September 11, 2001. I cannot imagine the horrific experience of being inside the Twin Towers while watching the planes approach, or still being inside when they came crashing down, or being on the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania or watching the plane approach your office in the Pentagon. May the Lord receive all of those precious souls into His Kingdom.
Requiescat in pace.
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