September 11th 2011 Ten years...

   My favourite place in the world to travel is New York City and I've been lucky enough to travel there three times. We went in 1998 for 5 days of a 9 week holiday from London, through Europe and then across the Atlantic!! It was a warm Spring/Summer and the city was magnificent. We spent lots of time around Broadway, Times Square and many of the usual sites.
   This included a trip to the top of the World Trade Centres Observation deck. We went to a Yankees game [my team] and most of the usual spots. Two returned tix saw us catch 'The Lion King' musical as well.
   Again in the winter of 2000 Simone and I returned to join in celebrating 'Thanksgiving' and to see the Christmas Lights turned on in Rockefeller Plaza. It was soooo coooold!! This was our trip before starting a family.
   In 2008 I was fortunate enough to go back as part of a 'study tour/work exploration trip and checked out a few 'new forms of church' alongside taking in the 9/11 Museum and Walking Tour led by people directly effected by the collapse of the Trade Centres that terrible day. As someone who values stories it's quite difficult to describe the depth of that experience.
   Today people across the world will reflect on the event which has in many ways defined the times. That day when four passenger aircraft crashed in New York, Washington and a field in Pennsylvania.
   Some will be mindful of terrorism, fundamentalist religious distortions and/or where they were!! Others will think about many lives lost in war, in the campaigns since and through violence in all it's forms.
   I will be thinking about the postcards in the basement of the 9/11 Museum and the messages of hope, prayer and support offered to all effected by this tragic turn of events. I will marvel at the thoughts and symbolism which has gone into the design of the Memorial Garden and the new 1 World Trade Centre.
   They will remind me of the importance of faith practices, reflection and creative spaces in which people can grieve, remember and move on... in their way and at their pace!!
   I will be thinking about Tommy whose story I heard walking around the 'Ground Zero' site as told by his mum!! He was an FDNY Firefighter who selflessly raced up the stairwell of the building in the hope of rescuing people and was there when the building collapsed. His parents fundraise for a scholarship in his name and run an annual golf charity day for the Foundation. I will remember that the week I was there in 2008 there was a news item about how one steel beam had importantly been placed in the footprint of the former buildings, because despite recent wet weather at that time it meant the reflective pools would be able to be finished by today... one more weeks delay and probably not!!
   I will ponder God's place in the sorrow, regret and lament and in the faces and lives of all who pause and pray or remember!!