[Tsaphan-developers] Wall Street Journal Article: God is Back

[Nick H. <NH...@SE...>]

I havent't read it all yet (not enough time), but it sounds good.
Nick
****************
God Is Back 
In the wake of an atrocity, he shows he hasn't forsaken New York. 

Friday, September 28, 2001 12:01 a.m. EDT 
God is back. He's bursting out all over. It's a beautiful thing to see. 
Random data to support the assertion: 
In the past 17 days, since the big terrible thing, our country has,
unconsciously but quite clearly, chosen a new national anthem. It is "God
Bless America," the song everyone sang in the days after the blasts to show
they loved their country. It's what they sang on television, it's what kids
sang in school, it's what families sang in New York at 7 p.m. the Friday
after the atrocity when we all went outside with our candles and stood
together in little groups in front of big apartment buildings. A friend of
mine told me you could hear it on Park Avenue from uptown to downtown, the
soft choruses wafting from block to block. 
You know why I think everyone went to Irving Berlin's old song, without
really thinking, as their anthem for our country? Because of the first word.

 <<...OLE_Obj...>> 
I find myself thinking in mystical terms of President Bush's speech to
Congress and the country, and I know from conversations with many people
that I am not alone. 
It seemed to me a God-touched moment and a God-touched speech, by which I
mean, in part, that little miracles surrounded it. A president and staff who
had no time to produce something fine and lasting, produced it. A president
who at his strongest moments had betrayed a certain "I'm kinda surprised to
be here" vibration had metamorphosed into a gentleman of cool command--the
kind of command you sense in a man who understands he ought to be there,
should be leading, can trust his own judgment and rely on you to respect it.
A great but wounded country heard exactly what it needed to pick itself up,
dust itself off and start all over again. 
Mr. Bush had a new weight, a new gravity, a new physical and moral comfort.
You could see it. A man who had never been able to read from a TelePrompTer
before used the TelePrompTer like a seasoned pro, which is to say like a man
who didn't need one. 
Mr. Bush found his voice, just at the moment when people tend to lose
theirs. He didn't rely on bromides or high flights or boilerplate; he gave
it to you plain and hard with the common words of a common man. He said, "We
will not tire, we will not falter, we will not fail." He said, "They will
hand over the terrorists or they will share in their fate." He said, "These
demands are not open to negotiation or discussion." 
He talked just like George W. Bush. 
He found himself amid the rubble. 
He talked of prayer like a man who'd been praying, and who understood that
tens of millions of Americans and others throughout the world were his
powerful prayer warriors. They prayed the right thing would be said and
done. It was. And now we feel we have what we needed, hoped we'd have,
weren't sure we had: A true commander in chief. 
All of this is quite wonderful, a tribute to President Bush and the men and
women who work so hard for him. But he, and they, could not have produced
that great night alone, and he, and they, would be the first to say it. 
 <<...OLE_Obj...>> 
In the early days after the blast, I visited several of the memorials that
have sprung up around town, in Union Square and in the heart of Greenwich
Village. I was struck, at first, by the all the religious imagery,
especially traditionally Catholic imagery--mass cards, pictures of the
Sacred Heart, little statues of St. Anthony and St. Francis, pictures of the
Virgin of Guadalupe, votive candles, prayers written on envelopes and pieces
of paper grabbed from a desk. 
Then I realized there was so much because so many of the firemen and
policemen who died were Catholic--Italian and Irish and Puerto Rican men
from Queens and Staten Island, from Jersey and Brooklyn. It was their
families and friends who had brought the mass cards and the statues of St.
Anthony, by tradition the patron saint of missing things, in those early
days, when they were still hoping that someone they loved would emerge from
the ruins. 
 <<...OLE_Obj...>> 
On Sunday I watched Oprah Winfrey at the wonderful Spirit of New York
special at Yankee stadium. She prayed aloud--a lot of people prayed
aloud--and Bette Midler made everyone feel better just by singing. 
That morning I had gone to our local mosque, the biggest in Manhattan, on
East 96th Street to show sympathy and regard for people who might be feeling
frightened and defensive. I watched as men prayed on their knees facing
Mecca. 
Then a friend came over and we talked about the speech she was going to make
at a memorial for a friend of hers who'd died at Cantor Fitzgerald. He was a
friend from her Alcoholics Anonymous group. I asked her what she wanted to
say, and she said she wanted to tell the rest of the group that the friend
they'd lost had always arrived everywhere early. He was early at AA
meetings, and he used to greet the newcomers at the back. 
On Sept. 11 he was early at work. After that he probably got early to
heaven, where he was probably greeted himself--by Bill W., the great man who
was one of the founders of AA. She wanted everyone to know that their friend
and Bill W probably had a great conversation about how meetings are held
these days, and about the importance of having greeters in the back for new
arrivals and first-timers. 
I wasn't surprised by what she said, not only because I know her faith but
because some little taboo or self-editing or reticence has lifted in the
past few weeks. People are feeling a little less self-conscious about
integrating their actual thoughts about their faith into the actual
statements they make to friends and family, to coworkers and colleagues. 
That's a great thing. In my little town that's a kind of miracle too. 
I was thinking the other day: In 1964, Time Magazine famously headlined "God
Is Dead." I hope now, at the very highest reaches of that great magazine,
they do a cover that says "God Is Back." 
Ms. Noonan is a contributing editor. Her new book, "When Character Was King:
A Story of Ronald Reagan," will be published by Random House this fall. Her
column appears Fridays. 



***********************************************************************
This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and
intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they
are addressed. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution
is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact
the sender by reply e-mail and destroy all copies of the original
message.
***********************************************************************