In just a few

days the nation will observe the tragedy of Sept. 11. Most people remember

where they were and what they were doing when the nation was attacked,

and over 3,000 innocent people murdered, by Muslim terrorists. I was at

home in front of the computer writing an article when my office manager

called and told me to turn on the television.

Like millions

of others, I stood unbelieving and transfixed by the scenes unfolding

before me. When the tower crashed to the ground, I tried to convince myself

that this had to be a disaster movie. Of course, it wasn't. I watched

hundreds and hundreds people die before my very eyes. It would get worse

before the day was over. When the story fully unfolded, the truth was

so much more horrible than a disaster movie could have been.

Over the next

days, weeks, and months, the nation was gripped first by shock, then grief,

and then by a terrible anger. People in my church lost friends. Carolyn

Fjeran, a vital part of our congregation, lost her first cousin, Todd

Beamer, on Flight 93.

What to do

in the aftermath of such carnage, such senseless horror? Within moments

of the tower's collapse, I mounted the American flag on my front porch.

and Stripes fluttering in the breeze. Most of those flags are gone now,

but not mine. I vowed that the flag would fly until those who committed

this slaughter were captured or dead. It is faded now and the gold colored-pole

has rusted to a dark brown, but I have kept the vow. On Sept. 11, 2002,

I will replace it with a new flag. I will replace it as many times as

I need to.

For the first

month, I prayed for the victims, their families, and the heroic workers

at ground zero. At our church we instituted a Community Service Award

and recognized our police officers, firefighters, and a soldier who had

served in Bosnia. Then, as grief settled into rage, I angrily prayed privately

that God would allow all the terrorists to be killed. King David prayed

such a prayer of vengeance in Psalm 109, so I felt justified. Maybe it

was the Marine in me that seems to surface, even after all these years,

at such a time.

Whenever I

had to fly, I would look at all Middle Eastern passengers on my flight

as potential adversaries, promising myself that this 50-something, gray-headed,

overweight guy would not go out without one last fight. I would stop at

businesses for gas and wonder if the owners of the store were "for

us or against us." I would pass a mosque and wonder what was really

being taught behind its walls. There will be those who judge me and say

that such feelings and emotions are un-Christ like. I would not disagree

with them. There are those that say that "we asked for it,"

that, somehow, "we deserved it." Those people, I would say,

are idiots and unworthy of any serious response.

A few months

later, I wrote an article about the police and firefighters, who were

Marine veterans, who had perished in the World Trade Center. That article

was published in Leatherneck magazine and received national distribution.

A few weeks later, I received a letter of thanks from a widow of one of

those brave police officers. He had been about to go off duty but had

rushed to the WTC instead. He died going into danger, trying to save lives.

She sent me a picture of him standing proudly in his NYPD uniform. I cried.

I try to put

things in perspective, especially as a Christian man and leader. I want

to care about the Taliban fighters incarcerated in Cuba, but I don't.

I want to believe that John Walker was just a good boy who was misguided

and deserves a second chance, but I don't. I want to believe that Islam

is really a peaceful, benign religion but I don't. President George W.

Bush has said that America has come to a firm resolve to eliminate terror.

I don't know about that. To me, with the attacks almost a year past, Americans

seemed more concerned about the baseball strike and the stock market than

about Osama bin Laden, the fighting men in Afghanistan, and Iraq.

This Wednesday,

I will participate in the September 11 Commemoration Services in Peachtree

City. I will join in a Christian service at Christ Our Shepherd Lutheran

Church at noon and will gather with others at the amphitheater that evening

for a community observance. Carolyn Fjeran, who has represented the Beamer

family well, will be speaking at the commemorative services in Newnan.

And, throughout this week and especially on Wednesday, I will try to remember

that, for whatever reason, God allowed this tragedy to happen and try

to discern what greater purpose all this may serve. But I will also meditate

on a verse from the prophet Micah:

Rejoice not

against me, O mine enemy: when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness,

the LORD shall be a light unto me. (Micah 7:8)

A correction:

In my column in the Citizen Review of Aug. 30, an alert reader e-mailed

me and said, "Your article mentioned the name of a church [with a

very, very long name] in North Carolina which contained the words 'Seventh-Day'...

Then you went on to mention that on Sunday morning there were only six

cars in the parking lot. Your article didn't go on to explain why there

were only six cars in the parking lot so I am assuming that you were indicating

the contrast between the size of the name and the number of worshipers.

Let me explain. The words 'Seventh-Day' in the title of the church is

significant of the fact that those people worship the Lord on the true

Sabbath, otherwise known as Saturday."

The reader

is correct in stating that some Christians believe that the "true"

Sabbath is Saturday and not Sunday. Certainly the Jewish Sabbath was and

is from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday. While more than 99 percent of

Christianity throughout history and the earth today believe that Christian

worship is to be on "The Lord's Day," or Sunday, I may have

misspoken regarding what I observed in North Carolina.

Evidently,

either the day was a Saturday and few were present or it was a Sunday

and a few were at the church for some other reason. I cannot recall. In

any event, the statement was unclear and I apologize. It was a minor possible

error but a possible error nevertheless.

[Father David

Epps is rector of Christ the King Charismatic Episcopal Church in the

Coweta/Fayette County area of south metro Atlanta. He may be contacted

at [email protected] or at www.ctkcec.org.]