' … It Will Never Be The Same Again'
Fourteen years ago, this day of this month started out like most others. It was a Tuesday that year.
Up early; took care of the dog; shaved, showered, dressed, made some breakfast; got out the door and made the 20-minute drive to work at a daily newspaper – The Dominion Post in Morgantown, W.Va.
I was just getting my bearings for the day when the classified advertising manager rushed into the newsroom. “A plane just flew into one of the Twin Towers!”
Weird – I knew exactly which Twin Towers she was talking about, even though we were several hundred miles and a few states away from New York City. And in that moment, I was a leisurely 90-second walk from the nearest TV. At that time, the newsroom I worked in didn’t have a TV. Radio? Check. Police Scanner? Check. TV? Go to the lunchroom.
I did; almost sprinted there.
As I rounded the last corner in the hallway and was able to see the TV, I watched the second commercial airliner fly into the second Twin Tower. In that moment, that little voice in my head said, simply, “it will never be the same again.”
I never contemplated what “it” was until sometime the next day, or maybe the day after. There wasn’t time.
We soon heard about a plane hitting the Pentagon and another crashing into a field in Somerset County, Pa. – roughly 90 minutes northeast of us. Shortly after getting our own reporter and photographer on the way to Shanksville, Pa., people just started showing up in the newsroom – writers, editors, photographers … even columnists.
We normally published in the morning, like the Courier & Press here in Evansville; our Sept. 11, 2001, issue had been on the streets for hours when the heinous attack on America began. We had another edition on the street by mid-afternoon, then started all over again for the regular Sept. 12 morning edition.
Nothing about the way I see the world has ever been the same. I may be wrong, but I believe I know what my parents and grandparents felt as they learned of the hideous events in the skies and the waters of Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941.
Because Sept. 11, 2001, was a Tuesday, St. John Paul II addressed the catastrophe the next day at the beginning of his weekly Wednesday general audience at the Vatican:
“I cannot begin this audience without expressing my profound sorrow at the terrorist attacks which yesterday brought death and destruction to America, causing thousands of victims and injuring countless people. To the President of the United States and to all American citizens I express my heartfelt sorrow. In the face of such unspeakable horror we cannot but be deeply disturbed. I add my voice to all the voices raised in these hours to express indignant condemnation, and I strongly reiterate that the ways of violence will never lead to genuine solutions to humanity’s problems.
“Yesterday was a dark day in the history of humanity, a terrible affront to human dignity. …The human heart has depths from which schemes of unheard-of ferocity sometimes emerge, capable of destroying in a moment the normal daily life of a people. But faith comes to our aid at these times when words seem to fail. Christ’s word is the only one that can give a response to the questions which trouble our spirit. Even if the forces of darkness appear to prevail, those who believe in God know that evil and death do not have the final say.”
When it comes to those events – and those words from a Holy Father who now occupies Heaven as a Saint – the 14 years that have passed seem like 14 seconds. Join me in praying for everyone involved in that dark day, and for our world and its future.
