Tributes to the Victims and Heroes of the Terrorist Attacks

Faith McDonnell
September 16, 2009

If you have visited the IRD website recently (and I hope you have!) you will find a new section that we have entitled, “Never Forgetting What We Lost on 9/11.”

The jihadist terrorist attacks that took place that day changed our country and changed our perception of the world forever. I, for one, do not want to think of September 11 as a National Day of Service and Remembrance. There are 364 other days of the year on which to perform acts of service. September 11 is for remembering and mourning those who were lost that day.

If I were to dictate how people should remember 9/11, as our government appears to be doing, I would encourage everyone to look at the list of names, such as here or here or here. The list that seems to go on and on forever so that you want to scroll through it as quickly as possible to convince yourself that really is an end to the horror. I would ask people to look at the faces of those who were killed and imagine what their last moments on earth were like. I would want them to muster up the courage to listen to some of the last recorded moments of our fellow human beings lives’ in the phone calls that are now available. (I have not been able to muster up my own courage to do that yet.)

The decision to transform September 11 into a day of service was what prompted me to begin writing tributes to all those who died were killed. Right now, my list of tributes is quite short, but it will continue to grow. Every single person who was killed deserves to be remembered. It will take a while, but we will do this. If you have a loved one who was killed on 9/11, or are interested in a particular individual that you heard about in the past, please let me know and I will put him or her at the top of my list. I am writing the tributes randomly, just as the people were killed randomly.

A blessing of this exercise in remembrance has been to learn of the existence, all over our country and even beyond, of memorials to the victims of 9/11. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to visit them all?

One more thing. A friend of mine was concerned that remembering in this manner, this “never forgetting,” stops forgiveness. But I have always (or at least since I met people who have truly forgiven great evil) believed that “forgive and forget” is not quite right. Real forgiveness is to look the evil behavior/action right in the eye and say, “I forgive you” even though this great evil has taken place, even though forgiveness costs me deeply because in my flesh I do not want to forgive. On the other hand, to “forget” is to deny the terrible consequences of the evil towards the victim. It dishonors the victim and it cheapens the concept of forgiveness. After all, Jesus said “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do,” but he did not say that they weren’t “doing” it.