September 11th—Two Years Later
Marjie Mack
It has been two years since the attacks on the World Trade
Center and Pentagon shocked us all on September 11, 2001.
I think most of us will always remember the horrible images
of that day as we tried to find out whether our families,
friends and colleagues in those buildings were safe. I remember
thinking that healing and recovery would be a long time coming
for all of us, but especially for the loved ones of those
who were killed. I felt so helpless and thought there was
little if anything I could do to help except to pray for everyone
involved. But God does bring good out of evil, and St. Paul’s
Episcopal Chapel was left standing undamaged right at the
edge of Ground Zero. For over eight months St. Paul’s
served as a conduit for our country’s sorrow, as well
as love and support for the thousands of rescue, recovery
and clean-up workers at Ground Zero.
A number of people from the Diocese of Maryland were among
the hundreds who volunteered to work 12-hour shifts at St.
Paul’s Chapel during those eight months. I volunteered
because, in my own small way, I wanted to help with the massive
relief efforts in the aftermath of the attacks. I knew St.
Paul’s did need people to serve coffee and food to workers,
and I went despite the fact that I really did not think one
ordinary, untrained person serving coffee would make much
of a difference. It never occurred to me that it would help
me begin to heal from the trauma of losing colleagues and
being very worried about friends’ and family members’
safety. I went to serve coffee, and I came away with an experience
that deeply touched my heart and soul. God was very present
at Ground Zero and I am more convinced than ever that he uses
us ordinary people to reach others—mostly one soul at
a time. The only word I could use to describe the experience
was “awesome.” I think my serving at St. Paul’s
did help others some, but I think it also helped me begin
the healing and recovery I needed.
As soon as we stepped out of the subway station onto the
sidewalk outside St. Paul’s and saw the fence, I began
to realize that this experience was going to be more than
just making up cots and serving food. Every single possible
area of the fence surrounding St. Paul’s for an entire
city block was covered in t-shirts, hats, flags, and signs
from people around the United States and the world to show
their sorrow and their love. We could not take our eyes off
the items on the fence as we slowly walked around the block
to enter St. Paul’s. It was an awesome sight to see
the undamaged chapel sitting on the edge of a totally devastated
site.
Inside the chapel was breathtaking. We quietly filed in as
a group and sank down into the pews in order to take it all
in. Every square inch of the chapel walls, railings and columns
was covered with letters, cards, artwork, and other signs
of love from people around the country and the world. Supplies
were stacked high in the balcony, along with a number of cots
where the clean-up workers could sleep for a few hours. It
was an awesome and heartfelt display of what good can come
from such an act of evil. It didn’t look like any church
we had ever seen before, and yet, God was so clearly present.
The magnitude of what we were involved in didn’t really
hit me until a few minutes later when our group of only 13
people from St. James’ Parish, Lothian, replaced the
day shift. We were the entire crew for the next 12 hours while
the clean-up workers—over 700 of them—streamed
in. I would have thought so many people coming through would
create a madhouse, but the workers were used to the routine
and obviously respected this place as God’s house. They
quietly came and got what they needed—whether it was
coffee, food, candy, first aid supplies, a cot to sleep on,
or a pew to sit and pray in. Most also looked for a friendly
face, someone to talk with or pray with or just sit quietly
with. They had the grace to let us serve them and to let us
know it meant a great deal to them.
Maybe it was because we volunteers inside St. Paul’s
Chapel were anonymous, with a different group of just ordinary
people working there every 12 hours. Maybe it was because
of the great sorrow experienced at Ground Zero. Maybe it was
because we all need to believe in something good after experiencing
something so evil. Maybe it was because, as volunteers, we
represented all of America who wanted to help in some small
way. Maybe it was the realization that everything needed there
had been donated. Maybe it was thankfulness for being alive.
Maybe it was because it was an experience of such magnitude
that everyone involved needed to share it with another human
being. Maybe it was because everyone involved with the clean-up
was still working through their emotions after September 11th.
Maybe each person just needed someone else to hear their story
in order to feel they were worthy. Whatever the reason, many
of the clean-up workers seemed to want and need to connect
with us on a personal level—one-to-one.
They needed to talk, and we listened to their stories. Most
of them were police and firefighters, but there were engineers,
construction workers, emergency medical technicians, and chaplains,
too. For some of the New York police, this was their normal
duty station—it had just changed tremendously and would
never be the same again. Some of the firefighters were assigned
there by New York City as a new duty station for the duration
of the clean-up. Some workers went to their day jobs in the
city or surrounding areas, then came to Ground Zero for food
and a few hours of sleep in a hard pew before working the
night shift, and they did this daily for over six months.
Some individuals, like Jim, a former chaplain at Ft. Meade,
Maryland, came from all over the country, taking a week or
two off their jobs and out of their lives to make their contribution.
Some were like my sister, Connie, an emergency room physician,
who came with her Michigan Disaster Alert Team, to work for
two weeks right after September 11th. Some worked day and
night to forget the horrible experience of September 11th.
Some worked day and night to remember a loved one killed that
day. All were moved by the experience. None were untouched
by the waves of love that poured in from all over the country.
And as for me, I will never forget God’s goodness that
I felt there.
I was just not prepared for the gratitude of those clean-up
workers. Despite being tired, worn out, dirty, lacking sleep,
and needing decompression time, every single one of those
workers thanked us for being there and for serving them. They
seemed especially moved that the enthusiastic, yet respectful
teenagers in our group would voluntarily take the time out
of their busy lives to go and serve others. Some of the clean-up
workers were so touched that our group had taken the train
all the way from Maryland just to work a 12-hour shift all
night to feed them, then turn around and take the train back
home again. A few of the New York City firefighters wanted
to make sure we didn’t miss getting to go out on the
platform and see the clean-up operation while we were in New
York, so they took us out a few at a time, past the guarded
barriers and showed us what was left of the World Trade Center.
I was unprepared for the vastness of the pit, the emptiness
of the entire area, the still boarded-up windows on surrounding
buildings, the ever-present ash, and the drapes and flags
on other buildings that still needed to come down after the
clean-up operation was completed. I was also unprepared to
be so moved by the lighted cross which just dominated the
entire pit. To think that those I-beams were found like that
in the wreckage!
Like the rescue and clean-up workers, none of our group was
untouched by our experience at Ground Zero. St. Paul’s
Chapel was a conduit of love and support for those who died,
those who participated in the rescue and clean-up, and those
who simply went there to help serve food. The experience of
working there enabled most of us to begin to heal and recover.
I think we will all carry some of those memories with us for
the rest of our lives. We went, prepared to give a little
of ourselves to help out; but as often happens, we received
a lot more from others than we gave. We felt the presence,
the hope and the healing power of God’s love at St.
Paul’s Chapel, and we will never forget it.