Miracles

There is probably no way to determine how many liturgies, prayer services, prayer vigils, rosaries, and other devotions have taken place in the past four weeks after the terrorists' attack on the United States.

Reports from friends from different parts of the United States describe memorial services that ranged from personal silent prayer in churches that were opened around the clock to elaborate celebrations of the Word using the music of Taizé in a church engulfed in candlelight.

What is clear in all of these experiences is the primordial need for humans at the time of disaster to come together, to be quiet, to listen, to pray, to sing, and to fathom the deep mystery of what has occurred-a mystery of incredible depth.

After the "God bless America" songs have been put away, we are faced with the staggering task of, Now what do we do? How do we make sense out of this tragedy?

Most opinions now concur that the suicide-assassins were not insane-far from it. They were on a mission to do what their religious mandate demanded-to eliminate the infidel by any means.

Their means was suicide for their noble cause, and they automatically would win their place in paradise. We are horrified. We are struck dumb with the prospect of the murder of thousands as the means to salvation.

We pray, we wonder, and we immerse even deeper into this mystery. In this communal pondering, however, is the avenue where comfort is afforded.

In the regional cathedral at noon on Thursday-the month's mind of the deaths-the bishop of the diocese presided over an ecumenical service. As he sat in the cathedra, a Jewish woman who is the rabbi in the neighboring synagogue sat at his left. At her left sat a Lutheran male minister. At the bishop's right sat a Muslim woman.

Each of the tree faiths read from the ambo an excerpt from the Scriptures of their respective traditions-the Psalms, the Koran, and the Gospels.

With the Roman cantor, we sang a responsorial psalm. The bishop spoke of mystery and consolation. His words touched and offered hope.

We observed many silences. It was in the silence that I claimed the miracle happened.

Twenty-five years ago, the scene would never have happened. Here in a holy space of a 2001-year-old religious tradition, whose history ranges from its version of the holy wars-the crusades-to the selfless giving of life for life in the medical-missionary effort, is unabashed praying, listening, singing, and pondering.

The Muslim woman, the rabbi, the minister, the bishop, and the assembly confluenced the contradictory strains of two millennia of religious wars and gave us a brief, though vivid, glimpse of the peaceable kingdom.

Three hundred of us were immersed in mystery. Three hundred people encountered the Holy One, whose time is not our time and whose plan surpasses national boundaries and cultures.

Yet, the Holy One will not let go of us.

It was a miracle.

You can reach Fred Moleck via email at fmoleck@earthlink.net