Sept. 11, 2022, column from the Amarillo Globe-News:
9/11 tragedy united people, but it didn't last
Almost immediately after the 9/11
attacks 21 years ago today, churches and other houses of worship saw increased attendance.
People felt a need to pray about the evil that had just happened and about the
uncertain future – and to just gather together.
But it wasn’t long before, as a
New York Times headline said, we returned to “Religion As Usual.” Gallup Poll
editor Frank Newport told the Times there was not a “great awakening or
a profound change in America’s religious practices.”
This beam from one of the World Trade Center
towers is located in the 9/11 Museum in New York
City. (Photo by Kathy Haynes)
Likewise, there was a brief time
when Republicans and Democrats, black and white, Christians, Jews and Muslims
held hands in apparent unity against an outside enemy.
Overlooking political differences
didn’t last long, either, and as the years have passed since 2001, Americans seem
to have given up on getting along with each other. On multiple issues, we are
at each other’s throats. Traditional values and practices are increasingly
vilified. Some people – I believe a small number but with loud megaphones –
want not only change but revolution. Another small number who see their history
and rights being threatened are willing to use violence to protect their places
in society.
Internationally, Russia and China
are more aggressive in pursuing their nations’ agendas. The Chinese Communists
appear ready to militarily bring Taiwan back into their fold, and Vladimir
Putin’s Russia versus Ukraine already looks like Hitler versus Poland in World
War II.
My wife, Kathy, and I don’t ignore
the news, but at suppertime these days, we tend to zone out. We’d rather retreat
to Mayberry to watch Andy Taylor and Barney Fife spitting out Aunt Bee’s
pickles than be unnerved by the latest crazy thing in the news.
In the past, Christians of various
denominations at least sometimes found common ground and agreed on certain
basic human values. Now, abortion divides us, and the term “Christian
Nationalists” is tossed around as if being Christian and patriotic are wicked.
On many social issues, right is wrong, wrong is right and the world seems
turned upside down.
We can’t even discuss those issues
graciously. Social media has removed the restraints on criticism and
judgmentalism. Politicians don’t compromise. Friendships like that of
Republican Ronald Reagan and Democrat Tip O’Neill are rare. Reagan even made
progress on nuclear disarmament in part because he got along personally with
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. As of last week, both of those men are gone,
and few such examples remain.
America is split to the extent that
some say another civil war is coming. Abraham Lincoln, our War Between the
States president, famously said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
Of course, he took the statement from the New Testament, where Matthew, Mark
and Luke all reported those words of Jesus.
Americans have access to plenty of
wise words, even in pop culture. Songwriter Walter Earl Brown provided
incentive for peace and harmony in “If I Can Dream,” made famous by Elvis
Presley soon after the assassination of presidential candidate Robert Kennedy:
“If I can dream
of a better land, Where all my brothers walk hand in hand, Tell me why, oh why,
oh why can't my dream come true. …
“We're
lost in a cloud, With too much rain, We're trapped in a world, That's troubled
with pain. But as long as a man has the strength to dream, He can redeem his
soul and fly.”
For
that dream to come true, we need a profound change in our stance toward others.
World War II anti-Nazi theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer understood:
“The first service one owes to others in a community involves
listening to them. Just as our love for God begins with listening to God’s
Word, the beginning of love for others is learning to listen to them. ...
We do God’s work for our brothers and sisters when we learn to listen to them.”
Mike
Haynes taught journalism at Amarillo College from
1991 to 2016 and has written for the Faith section since 1997. He can be
reached at haynescolumn@gmail.com.
Go to www.haynescolumn.blogspot.com for other recent columns.
