Sabbath Healing at Ground Zero
It must be terrible to be the survivor of a 9/11 victim. Imagine that nearly every time a story on terrorism or of another, related issue appears in the media that those now all-too-familiar pictures or video depicting the death of your loved one is used for illustration. How many times have these people had to relive in that way the shocking demise of their spouses, children, siblings, or friends? Apart from totally shutting out all media coverage from one's life, the horror of those last moments are virtually inescapable for those who carry the memories of these lost ones forward. Those visual reminders are ever-present.
Horror, grief, and anger carry a lot of power, and sometimes sustaining those feelings seems to be essential for getting by in life. Indeed, one may easily feel that to have those feelings somehow transformed into something less powerful is a betrayal of the dead. Yet, as terrible as those persistent images must be for the survivors, what is even worse is the way they have been used for political purposes and to wage cultural wars. As much as they may want to move on in life, there are others who are invested in these survivors not experiencing emotional growth or change, and are more than happy to exploit their trauma. The plea to "Never forget" can become a form of emotional blackmail, prompting citizens to stay mired in feelings of fear, helplessness, or suspicion. As long as the rawness remains, there is always a chance to cause division, to position oneself as the true ally of the victims and survivors.
Of course, one would have to be heartless and/or idiotic to assert that these survivors should "just get over it." As one who was in Washington on 9/11 trying to navigate my way on foot through a city in virtual lockdown, I know how the memories of that day can still come flooding back. Over time, those memories have less power for me, but never totally disappear. And I would never suggest that a similar journey toward peace is equally possible for these survivors; their level of trauma and loss is exponentially greater.
But that does not mean that the ongoing power of those emotions cannot nor should not be challenged. In the past nine years, we've already seen how those feelings have led to decisions in foreign affairs and public policy that have left thousands dead and injured, millions of Americans at yet deeper odds with both their government and their neighbors, and a certain paralysis in our national mind-set. As we've seen in recent weeks, in the controversy over the proposed Islamic community center, Park51, not far from "Ground Zero" in New York City, those emotions can still be readily roused in ways that nearly decimate some of the deepest values on which our country was built.
Consider some of the comments made by politicians such as Senator David Vitter, Sarah Palin, and Rudy Giuliani. "President Obama's support of building the mosque at Ground Zero is a slap in the face to the American people" (Vitter); “That feels like a stab in the heart collectively of Americans who still have that lingering pain from 9/11” (Palin); “If you’re going to so horribly offend the people most directly affected by this . . . how are you healing?” (Giuliani). Even the director of the Anti-Defamation League, Abraham Foxman, declared, regarding the survivors, "Their anguish entitles them to positions that others would characterize as irrational or bigoted.”
Ah, there it is, what seems to be an increasingly prevailing political mind-set in our country: our emotions entitle us to speak and behave in whatever ways we feel like. It doesn't matter if my likening President Obama to Hitler is not simply ludicrous but offensive to the very real victims of the Holocaust; my anger at his policies entitle me to make whatever comparisons I choose. It's okay for me to disparage African Americans or discriminate against Latinos because I'm upset about losing my job and not being able to find another. I'm justified in opposing any and all Muslims in their efforts to build community centers or mosques in my neighborhood because of my personal loss on 9/11.
But, as Henrik Hertzberg wrote in a recent issue of The New Yorker, ". . . as a guide to public policy, anguish is hardly better than bigotry. Nor is it an entitlement to abandon rationality itself." Yet we also need to be wary of those who make pretensions to rationality as a subterfuge for discrimination and prejudice. Few have been as skilled at wrapping such false rationalizations in inflammatory language as former House Majority Leader Newt Gingrich, who has declared, "America is experiencing an Islamist cultural-political offensive designed to undermine and destroy our civilization. . . . Sadly, too many of our elites are the willing apologists for those who would destroy them if they could."
Still, it's hard to reduce this issue to a simplistic conclusion that many Americans equate Islam with terrorism, even if many politicians seem happy not to discourage such a connection. Reports this week that nearly 1 out of 5 Americans believe President Obama is a Muslim seem to reinforce this observation. As Jack Shafer noted in a Slate magazine column,
What this does suggest is that many Americans connect Islam with a deeper sense of fear and uncertainty about life. It becomes a sort of shorthand for many different things that disturb us, of our discomfort with otherness. Thus, many are more than happy to label Obama as Muslim, as socialist, as akin to Hitler, as not a "real American." It doesn't matter--he's not like us, and what isn't like us is to be distrusted, feared, and marginalized. And again, human emotion takes center stage, as the driving principle for making the choices that will decide our future.
Those sort of discouraging words, opinions, and poll numbers prompt some to ask: Did Al Qaeda win after all on 9/11? New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, in declaring his support for the Park 51 project, declared, "part of being a New Yorker is living with your neighbors in mutual respect and tolerance. It was exactly that spirit of openness and acceptance that was attacked on 9/11." I believe Bloomberg is right--but the prevailing mood of many seems to be that such a spirit of openness and acceptance is the real problem, and that what was really attacked was our own personal senses of well-being.
One of the terrible ironies in all this, of course, is that many, if not most who want the government to bar the Park51 developers from building in lower Manhattan are the same people who express outrage at the growing government interference in private life. They express distress over the national deficit and debt, but their concerns about government spending and costs are immaterial when it comes to these issues of public policy--as if the deficit itself were not a national security issue. Again, the emotions of the moment dictate the politics, even when they produce unresolvable contradictions.
Preachers may feel at once loath and compelled to wade into this discussion from the pulpit. Yet, last week's Gospel lectionary reading (Luke 13:10-17), where Jesus heals on the Sabbath a woman who has been crippled for eighteen years, oddly resonates with this controversy over the Park51 development. At first glance this may look like a case of valuing emotion over law, and give credence to the project's detractors. It's not just about what what's enshrined in the law, it's about attending to the needs of the suffering first and foremost.
But, looking closer, we can see that Jesus is not somehow overturning the law, but opening it wider, to include those who have been marginalized and benighted. He can hold to the principles that have been the mainstay of his heritage and still make room for those who feel their anguish mocked by the law. He is not driven just by simple emotion and compassion, but by a conviction that there is no contradiction between the tenets of the law and his healing, any more than there is a break between the law and the synagogue leaders caring for their animals on the Sabbath.
In the same way, the controversy in New York City invites us to consider how our belief in religious freedom and our concern for those hurt by religious extremists can coexist. That belief is not just for those who share our convictions; it is for all people regardless of creed. Closing off opportunity is not what is healing; opening up the possibilities for all is. The healing power of the Park51 is not so much in its declared mission to build religious toleration and understanding, as it is in the fact that disallowing it would sustain the long-held hurt more than would building the project--even if it doesn't feel that way right now to many people.
Certainly anger and anguish is alive and powerful among many New Yorkers and survivors of 9/11 to this day. The images will never totally disappear from the media; the feelings will never totally abate--nor should they. But the sort of power they have on our lives is up to us. Resisting the other is what gives power to that anger and anguish; true welcome is what deprives nourishment to those emotions. Can we be strong enough to call our anger to a fast? Do we trust God and one another enough to engage in some Sabbath healing?
Horror, grief, and anger carry a lot of power, and sometimes sustaining those feelings seems to be essential for getting by in life. Indeed, one may easily feel that to have those feelings somehow transformed into something less powerful is a betrayal of the dead. Yet, as terrible as those persistent images must be for the survivors, what is even worse is the way they have been used for political purposes and to wage cultural wars. As much as they may want to move on in life, there are others who are invested in these survivors not experiencing emotional growth or change, and are more than happy to exploit their trauma. The plea to "Never forget" can become a form of emotional blackmail, prompting citizens to stay mired in feelings of fear, helplessness, or suspicion. As long as the rawness remains, there is always a chance to cause division, to position oneself as the true ally of the victims and survivors.
Of course, one would have to be heartless and/or idiotic to assert that these survivors should "just get over it." As one who was in Washington on 9/11 trying to navigate my way on foot through a city in virtual lockdown, I know how the memories of that day can still come flooding back. Over time, those memories have less power for me, but never totally disappear. And I would never suggest that a similar journey toward peace is equally possible for these survivors; their level of trauma and loss is exponentially greater.
But that does not mean that the ongoing power of those emotions cannot nor should not be challenged. In the past nine years, we've already seen how those feelings have led to decisions in foreign affairs and public policy that have left thousands dead and injured, millions of Americans at yet deeper odds with both their government and their neighbors, and a certain paralysis in our national mind-set. As we've seen in recent weeks, in the controversy over the proposed Islamic community center, Park51, not far from "Ground Zero" in New York City, those emotions can still be readily roused in ways that nearly decimate some of the deepest values on which our country was built.
Consider some of the comments made by politicians such as Senator David Vitter, Sarah Palin, and Rudy Giuliani. "President Obama's support of building the mosque at Ground Zero is a slap in the face to the American people" (Vitter); “That feels like a stab in the heart collectively of Americans who still have that lingering pain from 9/11” (Palin); “If you’re going to so horribly offend the people most directly affected by this . . . how are you healing?” (Giuliani). Even the director of the Anti-Defamation League, Abraham Foxman, declared, regarding the survivors, "Their anguish entitles them to positions that others would characterize as irrational or bigoted.”
Ah, there it is, what seems to be an increasingly prevailing political mind-set in our country: our emotions entitle us to speak and behave in whatever ways we feel like. It doesn't matter if my likening President Obama to Hitler is not simply ludicrous but offensive to the very real victims of the Holocaust; my anger at his policies entitle me to make whatever comparisons I choose. It's okay for me to disparage African Americans or discriminate against Latinos because I'm upset about losing my job and not being able to find another. I'm justified in opposing any and all Muslims in their efforts to build community centers or mosques in my neighborhood because of my personal loss on 9/11.
But, as Henrik Hertzberg wrote in a recent issue of The New Yorker, ". . . as a guide to public policy, anguish is hardly better than bigotry. Nor is it an entitlement to abandon rationality itself." Yet we also need to be wary of those who make pretensions to rationality as a subterfuge for discrimination and prejudice. Few have been as skilled at wrapping such false rationalizations in inflammatory language as former House Majority Leader Newt Gingrich, who has declared, "America is experiencing an Islamist cultural-political offensive designed to undermine and destroy our civilization. . . . Sadly, too many of our elites are the willing apologists for those who would destroy them if they could."
Still, it's hard to reduce this issue to a simplistic conclusion that many Americans equate Islam with terrorism, even if many politicians seem happy not to discourage such a connection. Reports this week that nearly 1 out of 5 Americans believe President Obama is a Muslim seem to reinforce this observation. As Jack Shafer noted in a Slate magazine column,
Unfortunately, the percentage of poll respondents who said Obama is a Muslim and could also successfully define Islam was not on the list of questions. Nor was the question, "If a Muslim bit you on the a**, would you be able to identify his religion?" I'm guessing that the percentage of respondents who would answer yes to either of those questions would be low, as would the percentage who could accurately describe the tenets of faith observed by Muslims.
What this does suggest is that many Americans connect Islam with a deeper sense of fear and uncertainty about life. It becomes a sort of shorthand for many different things that disturb us, of our discomfort with otherness. Thus, many are more than happy to label Obama as Muslim, as socialist, as akin to Hitler, as not a "real American." It doesn't matter--he's not like us, and what isn't like us is to be distrusted, feared, and marginalized. And again, human emotion takes center stage, as the driving principle for making the choices that will decide our future.
Those sort of discouraging words, opinions, and poll numbers prompt some to ask: Did Al Qaeda win after all on 9/11? New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, in declaring his support for the Park 51 project, declared, "part of being a New Yorker is living with your neighbors in mutual respect and tolerance. It was exactly that spirit of openness and acceptance that was attacked on 9/11." I believe Bloomberg is right--but the prevailing mood of many seems to be that such a spirit of openness and acceptance is the real problem, and that what was really attacked was our own personal senses of well-being.
One of the terrible ironies in all this, of course, is that many, if not most who want the government to bar the Park51 developers from building in lower Manhattan are the same people who express outrage at the growing government interference in private life. They express distress over the national deficit and debt, but their concerns about government spending and costs are immaterial when it comes to these issues of public policy--as if the deficit itself were not a national security issue. Again, the emotions of the moment dictate the politics, even when they produce unresolvable contradictions.
Preachers may feel at once loath and compelled to wade into this discussion from the pulpit. Yet, last week's Gospel lectionary reading (Luke 13:10-17), where Jesus heals on the Sabbath a woman who has been crippled for eighteen years, oddly resonates with this controversy over the Park51 development. At first glance this may look like a case of valuing emotion over law, and give credence to the project's detractors. It's not just about what what's enshrined in the law, it's about attending to the needs of the suffering first and foremost.
But, looking closer, we can see that Jesus is not somehow overturning the law, but opening it wider, to include those who have been marginalized and benighted. He can hold to the principles that have been the mainstay of his heritage and still make room for those who feel their anguish mocked by the law. He is not driven just by simple emotion and compassion, but by a conviction that there is no contradiction between the tenets of the law and his healing, any more than there is a break between the law and the synagogue leaders caring for their animals on the Sabbath.
In the same way, the controversy in New York City invites us to consider how our belief in religious freedom and our concern for those hurt by religious extremists can coexist. That belief is not just for those who share our convictions; it is for all people regardless of creed. Closing off opportunity is not what is healing; opening up the possibilities for all is. The healing power of the Park51 is not so much in its declared mission to build religious toleration and understanding, as it is in the fact that disallowing it would sustain the long-held hurt more than would building the project--even if it doesn't feel that way right now to many people.
Certainly anger and anguish is alive and powerful among many New Yorkers and survivors of 9/11 to this day. The images will never totally disappear from the media; the feelings will never totally abate--nor should they. But the sort of power they have on our lives is up to us. Resisting the other is what gives power to that anger and anguish; true welcome is what deprives nourishment to those emotions. Can we be strong enough to call our anger to a fast? Do we trust God and one another enough to engage in some Sabbath healing?
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