Episcopal Press and News
Ecumenical Delegation Visits US Churches to Express Solidarity in Wake of Terrorist Attacks
Episcopal News Service. November 14, 2001 [2001-328]
James Solheim
(ENS) Two months after terrorist attacks in New York and at the Pentagon, a seven-member ecumenical delegation representing the World Council of Churches (WCC) visited churches in New York, Chicago, Washington, DC and Oakland "to express the solidarity and compassion of the worldwide ecumenical fellowship" and to discuss the implications of September 11 and the military action in Afghanistan "for the witness of the churches" in America and the rest of the world.
Presiding Bishop Frank T. Griswold welcomed the delegation to the Episcopal Church Center for an ecumenical prayer service in the chapel on November 8. In a conversation with local church leaders in the afternoon, the delegation members shared their own experiences and were exposed to a range of testimonies. "We have come to agonize with you," said Bishop Mvumelwano Dandala of the Methodist Church of Southern Africa, president of the South African Council of Churches and leader of the delegation. He pointed out that members of the "Living Letters" delegation came from areas where violence is commonplace.
Jean Zaru, presiding clerk of the Religious Society of Friends in Ramallah, Palestine, said that she was in Washington during the attack on the Pentagon and said that the churches must join the efforts to end the violence that is consuming the world. Metropolitan Elias Audi, from the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch based in Beirut, Lebanon, added, "We know what it means to suffer--and to sympathize." He said that he hoped the Americans would now see more clearly the pain in other parts of the world. "I come from a tormented area--and may God forgive those who put America in such a difficult place."
Emotions still raw
"We still smell our loved ones in the rubble," said Bishop Stephen Bouman of the Metropolitan New York Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), describing the many funerals he has attended. "The emotions are still raw," he said, but "the world is ready to talk with its maker." The churches are packed--with many people who don't regularly attend church, he noted. "Maybe we were born and baptized for this moment."
Bouman said that he sensed sadness, rather than anger among people. "Our soul has been wounded," he said, describing a "paralysis" that prevents many people from moving on with their lives.
A pastor in his synod anointed firefighters on the forehead before they rushed back into the World Trade Center in an attempt to rescue people. People who escaped described the glistening crosses on those foreheads moving up as they moved down to safety. "I think of Jacob's ladder," Bouman said. "People going up the tower, anointed, to their death--others coming down to escape. And God was at both ends."
Other New York church leaders said that they gave instructions to open all the churches, light the candles and blast music into the streets--but they described the haunting realization that the country was facing an "unseen war, an unseen enemy."
"The United States is no longer an impregnable fortress of safety," added the Very Rev. Leonid Kishkovsky, ecumenical officer for the Orthodox Church in America, but a time when many people are "looking to spiritual values and also reaching out to people of other faiths."
Stunned silence
A chilly breeze blew the acrid smell of the ruins away from members of the delegation as they huddled on a makeshift wooden platform and stared in stunned silence at Ground Zero, what was left of the towers. Zaru said that she was "profoundly grieved by the destruction and devastation at the site" and found herself thinking of Palestinians who die in equally senseless acts of violence every day.
In Washington the delegation met with representatives of the US Catholic Conference of Bishops and with representatives of the American Muslim Council. In Chicago they met with representatives of local ecumenical councils and WCC member churches at the ELCA headquarters. The visit concluded when the group met with the NCC's general assembly in Oakland.
Church leaders in Chicago said that it is not easy to frame a Christian response in the face of such evil acts. "The terrorists who hijacked airplanes full of innocent people with the intent of murdering thousands of innocent people were morally bankrupt," said the Rev. Jon Enslin, interim ecumenical officer of the ELCA.
For some participants in the conversations--including members of historic "peace churches" who are usually pacifists--the attacks were so disproportionately evil that they justify a military response.
Dr. Jean Martensen of the ELCA said that the climate of public opinion in the United States, and the general ignorance of the nation's policies in the Middle East, make dialogue difficult. "The contradictions between what we believe about ourselves and what we do has never been clearer," she said. Team members who live with terror and violence urged the American churches to help them find an alternative.
Bishop Samuel Azariah of the Church of Pakistan was in New York September 11 and witnessed the destruction of the towers. He said that at the time he agreed with President George Bush's call for justice but added, "Today I am not sure that justice is being implemented." He is worried that the bombing in Afghanistan is generating popular support for "that small group of people who bring terror to the world. Terrorism has to go but not in the way that is going on in Afghanistan." He asked where the churches and the international community were when the Taliban was killing thousands of people--and "the conscience of the world was dead."
The language of victims
Several members of the delegation were surprised and moved by the depth of pain expressed by the American church leaders. The language most often heard by the rest of the world is one of "victory, prosperity, power," said Septemmy Lakawa of Indonesia. "They never hear the language of victims" coming from Americans.
Dr. Bernice Jackson Powell of the United Church of Christ took courage from the testimonies of delegation members. "This can be a kairos moment," she said. "We can face the pain we cause--or not. What we're facing now in this country is pivotal and our choice has got to be from the word of God, the Sermon on the Mount. If we miss this opportunity, I believe this nation will never face another peaceful day."
George Lemopoulos, acting general secretary of the WCC, said that the conversations reflected the spirit of the WCC's Decade to Overcome Violence, an emphasis adopted at the Eighth Assembly in Zimbabwe in 1998.
"We are not bringing answers," said Dandala. "We are bringing love. We wanted to touch you and we wanted you to touch us."
In reporting on the visit to the staff at the Church Center, Griswold expressed similar sentiments. The response to the terrorist attacks had helped Americans to "accept our fragility as human beings, revealing our vulnerabilities," he said. It also created bonds that would be important sources of mutual support in the future.
This article is based on reports by Philip Jenks, director of communications for the US office of the WCC.