9/11 – Nizkor – Let Us Remember

9/11.

Two numbers that will always carry heavy significance for those of us who remember.

How can we ever forget that dread-filled day when the United States was subject to multiple acts of terrorism?

We will not forget – we will remember: Nizkor – Let us remember.

I’m sure each one of us has our own memories of where we were when we heard the unbelievable news of what happened. But rather than evoke images of the destruction and the horror, let us evoke memories of the PEOPLE:

• those who died
• those who were injured
• those who were heroes
• those whose lives were irrevocably changed.

This is our time for conjuring those memories – for giving life to our memories, because it is those memories which will help sustain and nurture us.

The author Philip Roth once wrote: “You mustn’t forget anything. To be alive, is to be made of memory – if a man’s not made of memory, he’s made of nothing.”

To be alive is to be made of memory. We remember our dead to show that we have grown up and arrived. It enables our loved ones to remain part of us, even though they have parted from us. Our spiritual life does not only consist of reactions to the present and hopes for the future, but also what we can recall in our minds and hearts of what has been. This gives us a mechanism for coping with the pain, the loss and allowing ourselves to live our lives to the fullest.

If we were to attempt to crystallize the flood of memories, thoughts and feelings that now envelope us as we remember those events from that horrendous day 13 years ago, we realize that we best honor those who died, by affirming our own lives and how we choose to lead them.

Yesh Kochavim – There Are Stars, by Hannah Senesh

There are stars up above, so far away we only see their light long, long after the star itself is gone. And so it is with people we have loved – their memories keep shining ever brightly though their time with us is done. But the stars that light up the darkest night, these are the lights that guide us. As we live our lives, these are the ways we remember.

Nizkor – We will always remember.