September 8, 2006

FIVE YEARS LATER - REMEMBER, REFLECT, RENEW

I, like most Americans, will never forget the morning of September 11, 2001.  It was a clear blue Tuesday morning in Washington, DC and the only impending change was the fading summer.  Little did we know the world as we knew it would be forever altered.

As I prepared to leave for my commute to the Capitol, I heard the following words broadcast on the television in the other room: “We have reports that a small aircraft has hit the World Trade Center in Manhattan.”  I turned to watch the beginning of the coverage of what would unfold to be events so horrific, so painful, and so indescribable that we could not even give it a name.  We – for lack of words to describe the events of that day – refer to them with just the numbers “nine-eleven.”

Before the reports of an explosion at the Pentagon were broadcast, my wife Kathy and I had felt a rumbling in our living room that instinctively told us something was wrong.  We would soon learn that the Pentagon, only a mile or so from where we were watching the events of that morning unfold on television, had just been struck by terrorists.

As the hours, days, and weeks passed we saw, read, and heard countless heartbreaking stories of loss; children, wives, husbands, grandparents, friends, and neighbors gone in an instant.  I felt that regardless of our relation to the victims, as a nation we all felt the grief very deeply for every person lost in these senseless acts.

Five years later our nation will once again pause to set aside the differences, opinions, and views that may divide us to remember and reflect the tragedy of that day.

Human nature allows time to heal the painful scars that were created on 9/11.  But, I believe that we can never forget the sacrifices of so many innocent people who were lost on that terrible day.

On this fifth anniversary let us remember the victims in prayer, reflect on the challenges we have overcome as a nation, and renew our belief that even from the ashes of tragedy, America is a place where every new morning holds the potential for even better beginnings.