REMEMBERING SEPTEMBER 11, 2001

September Midday Mass

The tall old priest entered the half-lit sacristy,
fresh from his usual Tuesday morning studies.
The fair-haired acolyte with the bad complexion
was ready, vested, standing in the dimness
quietly. The old priest noticed he was sniffing
and his eyes were red. A failed romance,
he thought; but keeping his own rule on chit-chat
in the sacristy, vested silently.
The old familiar motions and the prayers
displaced whatever thoughts he might have had;
the only dialogue to break the stillness was
the rote exchange of formal preparation.

Then, in one motion as he slipped his hand
beneath the pale green veil, the other hand
upon the burse, he lifted vested vessels,
turned and followed in the sniffing server’s
wake. Eyes lowered to the holy burden
in his hand, he failed to notice that
the chapel for this midday feria —
on other days like this with one or two
at most — was full of worshippers; until
he raised his eyes, and saw the pews were filled —
but undeterred began the liturgy:
the lessons and the gospel from last Sunday,
his sermon brief, but pointed, on the texts.
It wasn’t till the acolyte began
the people’s prayers, and choked out words of planes
that brought a city’s towers down, and crashed
into the Pentagon, and plowed a field
in Pennsylvania, that the old priest knew
this was no ordinary Tuesday in
September —
not ordinary time at all,
that day he missed the towers’ fall.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
March 8, 2008

D-DAY - IN REMEMBRANCE

In remembrance of all who fought and all who died in the Normandy beach landings which began on June 6, 1944, and in the battles to secure territory that followed the landings.

The Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial in France is located on the site of the temporary American St. Laurent Cemetery, established by the U.S. First Army on June 8, 1944 and the first American cemetery on European soil in World War II. The cemetery site, at the north end of its ½ mile access road, covers 172.5 acres and contains the graves of 9,387 of our military dead, most of whom lost their lives in the D-Day landings and ensuing operations. On the Walls of the Missing in a semicircular garden on the east side of the memorial are inscribed 1,557 names. Rosettes mark the names of those since recovered and identified.

From the American Battle Monuments Commission.

It's amazing that the plan for an invasion of this magnitude by the Allied Forces was kept secret and completely surprised the German forces in the area.

Grandpère and I visited in the late 1980s. The cemeteries are sad and beautiful. The ghosts linger on the hallowed ground. I remember seeing old veterans searching for the graves of their comrades in arms, and family members searching for the graves of their loved ones, and the quiet tears that often followed once they found the markers.

Until I visited the site, movies notwithstanding, I never quite realized the difficulty of the landing at Omaha Beach, the steepness of the cliffs, the exposure once the troops reached the top, not to mention those who were shot or drowned when they left the landing boats. More than 4,400 Allied troops died in a single day.

For those who died in the service of their countries.

ALMIGHTY God, our heavenly Father, in whose hands are the living and the dead; We give thee thanks for all those thy servants who have laid down their lives in the service of their countries. Grant to them thy mercy and the light of thy presence, that the good work which thou has begun in them may be perfected; through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord. AMEN.
(Book of Common Prayer, p. 42)

Note: Reposted from last year and the year before.