Sowing Seeds

September 13, 2012

I wrote the following about a year ago. I wanted to share it again, because it still feels right to me…

Eleven years and 2 days ago, I woke up in my dorm room to get ready for class. I felt sick, something didn’t feel right and my stomach felt all types of pukey… I left a VM for my prof, went back to bed and woke up in a daze a bit later, with my roomie telling me a plane crashed into the World Trade Center. I wasn’t fully awake, but after hearing that I couldn’t seem to drift back to sleep. By the time I finished showering and got out to the lounge to see what was going on, I was there just in time to watch live footage of a second plane crashing into the the towers. In utter shock and disbelief, the group of students in the lounge, myself included, was silent.

In the coming months, a lot of people didn’t like me and what I had to say. As America mobilized, I felt the flag flying to be hollow, the response to be inadequate… I couldn’t rah rah against the aggressors or join in the fist shaking. Instead I felt a deep sense of sadness, both for the innocent lives lost and for America’s complete lack of understanding. Of course the initial response was anger at Osama and al Qaeda, but why could no one admit that our policies and our actions as a nation brought on these attacks in some way.

This is not to say that I sympathize or sympathized with the terrorists. Those men, even if they believed what they were doing was right, were dead wrong. They acted with pure evil in their hearts and minds. They were devils in the flesh. But, to ignore the root cause is, to say the least, unfortunate… and unfortunately, the American way.

Over these past 11 years, my heart still aches for the families who lost innocent fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, children… and my heart still aches for a nation that has never begun to address the roots, still addressing only the symptoms. As time passed, it became a bit more acceptable to discuss the role of American policy and practice in leading to the events on that fateful September morn, but it seems that discussing our policies is as far as it goes.

For the past few days, I’ve been praying that one day we can live in a nation where we have leaders who not only see and discuss the root causes of our problems but address them. I support our current administration, but in this regard, they have not done nearly enough… and I pray that somehow and someday that will change.

Join me in prayer for the hurting, the lost, the innocent, the confused, the leaders, the people, the problems of our great nation.

The verdict is in….

But… but… but… but… I thought… it’s not about race… sigh…

Grace

In this Easter season, this message is a pretty important one to remember folks…

Simple Tom

 

 

 

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