09/11/2026
Pastor Ryon's Friday Letter:
Beloved Broadway,
September 11, 2001.
Those of us old enough to remember the day can all recall exactly where we were when we heard the World Trade Center towers had fallen and the Pentagon had been attacked.
We were shocked and terrified as we realized the extent of the attacks and number of deaths. In the following days, our hearts weighed with sadness for the families of the victims in New York, D.C., and Pennsylvania.
The twenty-first century had fully arrived – with terror.
On Friday, September 14 of that week, a national prayer service took place at the Washington National Cathedral. It was a meaningful service which I have watched on You Tube many times over the years.
Billy Graham, then age 84, preached the sermon. He said, “I’ve become an old man now, and I’ve preached all over the world. And the older I get, the more I cling to that hope that I started with many years ago…”
He then quoted from the old hymn “How Firm A Foundation”:
Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,
for I am thy God, and will still give thee aid;
I'll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.
At the service, the Dean of the Cathedral Nathan Baxter also spoke. He quoted the ancient words of Jeremiah the prophet:
A voice is heard in Ramah,
lamenting and bitter weeping;
Rachel is weeping for her children,
and she refuses to be comforted
because they are no more.
Speaking prophetically himself, Dean Baxter called the people to prayer, asking God for divine wisdom for the nation’s leaders that “we not become the evil we deplore.” As the people stood, he then prayed in the name of the God of Abraham and Muhammad and the Father of Jesus Christ.
That same day, Congress passed the Authorization for Use of Military Force with a vote in the house of 420-1. California Congresswoman Barabara Lee credited Dean Baxter’s prayer for her courage in casting the sole dissenting vote against the authorization.
In the aftermath of the attacks, there was much a spirit of unity and compassion among the people of the United States and among leaders around the world. But soon that unity was lost, as the United States ventured into two major Middle East conflicts, one in Afghanistan and the other – gravely unjustifiably – in Iraq. This was a terrible tragedy in our history as a country and the history of the world, from which neither has yet to fully recover.
On this 25th anniversary of 9/11, we solemnly remember the 2,977 innocent lives lost on that fateful day. We also solemnly remember the almost million lives lost, including the more than 7,000 American military lives lost, in the Afghanistan and Iraq wars which followed.
9/11 is a day for remembering. It is a day for praying. And it is also a day for peacemaking.
A quarter of a century after their attacks, the perpetrators of the evil of 9/11 would wish nothing more than to see Americans turning on one another and especially turning on Muslim neighbors near and far.
We truly honor September 11th when we stand against all enmity and violence and pray and work for the peace and wellbeing of all people everywhere.
So then, let us not become the evil we deplore; but let us work and keep working to seek to overcome all evil with all our good.
May the God of Abraham and Muhammad and the Father and Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen and help us and cause us to stand together.
And may this day that tore us apart 25 years ago be a day that binds us together now and always.
In the same hope that I too started with,
Ryon
