Adults are always telling us, the younger generation, "Don't you ever forget." The day America's security was attacked was one of the worst days in history, no doubt. It wasn't war. It wasn't mob action. It wasn't rebellion, or an underground control system, silently manipulating America. It was a massacre of many, many innocent lives. Innocent because they could not defend themselves and they had not in any way personally threatened their killers. No one saw it coming, and you hear all the time about people who, only through the grace of God, made it out alive, and how some lost their lives going in to save others, but also how many more were killed suddenly and dramatically on that otherwise ordinary day in September. And the older, wiser generation tells us never to forget.
For me, it was first a process of learning. In 2001, I would have been about seven years old. I didn't know at the time that it had happened. Nor, later, when the memorial day came around year after year, I didn't realize that it had occurred during my lifetime. I encourage you not to blame my parents for "over sheltering me", for ironically, it wasn't until after I was home-schooled that I began to see the world beyond my front door. I thought 9/11 was something that had happened years in the past, like WWII. The truth probably didn't occur to me until I was in my teens, and even then, I didn't understand it.
It was history. It had happened. Like war for many people, it's something that happens, and it's too bad, but what can be done about it? 9/11 was another history lesson. It was like the Revolution, the Civil War, and any other event that had happened in history. What did it matter that more men died somewhere than in all the wars in Asia? It had happened so long ago, it had nothing to do with me, I spit back the information on a sheet of paper, and that was that. And this isn't a problem confined to my own sympathies, I know. There are numerous stories, gruesome, that make some people break down in tears while others shake it off their backs. Those sort of things come and go, and to an ignorant child like I was, death didn't mean very much.
Now I know what that means. In a world ravaged with abortion and impending religious restrictions, I face the possibility of terror for my life and the life of those around me. In a few years, I could lose everything and everyone that I love and I need for a feeling of security. And then I remember that this is exactly what is going on all over the world, and has happened, and will happen; and I pray it won't come in my time. "Please, God, don't bring this test before me." I wish I could pray for an hour before the Blessed Sacrament and make everything right, but "so do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that's been given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil." From there, it is only a small step to understanding the horror of 9/11.
I understand all this, but what are adults telling us when they say "never forget"? Some may mean that they want us to take up the pitchforks of revenge, but I have a great respect for the adults who have told me never to forget. They are the kind of people who advocate forgiveness, and they don't promote war or anything like that. So I think they are trying to say "never forget, because it was horrible". Is it just classic worrying about the future generation? For what about Pearl Harbor? What about the Civil War? What about the various persecutions that drove some of our ancestors here? We never hear them mentioned. I think the adults in our lives are trying to express to us their feelings and memories about 9/11. It's the only logical motivation I have come to, and it makes sense. If you tell someone to "never forget" some great event, it's usually something you have deep feelings about. I don't think it's a phrase that means "take action"; I think it means "please don't forget what brought my generation to its knees".
I may have said something like this last year, for it seems that many lessons have to be learned twice, but I think I focused more on the respect-for-life aspect in last year's entry. Last year, Osama bin Laden was killed, and I was disturbed by the national reaction. Looking over it with sympathetic eye, I can understand, but my natural reaction to the man's death was sorrow. It is another soul we cannot not save, another life we could not touch, another man whose life was wasted for evil. It was a relevant topic for 9/11.
Today, I want to once again remind you to remember all the deaths of the world, especially the ones that were most unfair – the persecutions, and attacks on women and children for example – and pray fervently for world peace.
"Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and the end of the war."
"I want you ... to continue to pray the Rosary every day in honour of Our Lady of the Rosary, in order to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war, because only she can help you."
"You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace. The war is going to end; but if people do not cease offending God, a worse one will break out during the pontificate of Pius XI. When you see a night illumined by an unknown light, know that this is the great sign given you by God that he is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine, and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father."
"Without prayer there is no peace. Therefore, dear children, I urge you to pray for peace before the Cross."
The end of the world, we know, will not come smoothly, but let our prayers, to the best of our ability, combat the evil done and soothe our Savior's bleeding heart. Let us never forget the evil and sorrow of 9/11, and yet it is not the worst atrocity to have ever happened. Let us pray the horrors that have built up in the eastern hemisphere will not come find their home in America.
~Meggy
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