Because in the Dearborn area there are more Middle Easterners than anywhere other than the Middle East, this past month has been a most challenging time.

It has been several weeks since the tragedy in New York and Washington and Pennsylvania. 911 is a universal call for help. In this case, 911 is the 11th day of the 9th month. 9-11-2001. September 11, a day of infamy. We are still suffering from the tragedy, and will for all time to come.

Today we want to consider our response to the tragedy of 9-11, which by now has become a tragedy for the whole world.

We read in the psalm for today, "Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge." O yea? Did the Lord save the thousands who died in this tragedy? How can we believe that ancient hymn in the wake of what has happened in New York? Unbelievers point to scriptures like that and ask for an explanation.

What do you tell them? Where was God then? One friend said God was holding up the buildings until two-thirds of the people could get out. Another friend said God was crying with the survivors. Still another said God was in his heaven, thinking, "I'm sorry about the way my children behaved today."

Then comes our Old Testament prophet, Amos: "You put off the evil day and bring near a reign of terror. You lie on beds inlaid with ivory and lounge on your couches. You dine on choice lambs and fattened calves. You strum away on your harps like David and improvise on musical instruments. You drink wine by the bowlful and use the finest lotions, but you do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph."*

Stephen Harris commented, "Amos saw that behind the national prosperity and private luxury was a callous indifference to human rights, which was no less a sin than sacrificing to idols. He was the first prophet to argue that social justice is as vital to religion as worshipping one God alone." Is Amos telling us it is our own fault that terrorists terrorize us? That's what the terrorists want us to believe.

Amos' message of woe is addressed to those who feel secure, who live at ease, in comfort, indifferent to the problems and oppression of others. The northern kingdom, here called "Joseph," lived in luxury and excess. Amos was a prophet in the northern kingdom. Because the southern kingdom also displayed apathy and apostasy, he refers to "Zion" as well.

Does that sound at all like us, in the good ole' USA? Is Amos' message for us today?

We spend more on pet food than it would take to supply health care and basic nutrition for all developing countries; We spend about as much on cosmetics as it would take to supply safe water and sanitation for all developing countries; We spend as much on perfume as it would take to provide reproductive health care for all women in developing countries! So is Amos correct? Maybe we needed to be awakened?

Then comes Paul, who in our Epistle says, "People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction."

Then he adds, "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil." Maybe you saw the lady who was stopped on the street by a TV journalist after the disaster. She said, "I'm not interested in making money any more. My family and my relationships are the most important things in life." Amen!

Now look again at our Gospel. Jesus told about a rich man whose life priority had been himself -- a me-first mentality. He had lived by selfish priorities. (I guess our current nomenclature is "consumerism") When he arrived in hell and looked across the chasm, he saw that homeless man who had loitered just outside his gate on earth. He had ignored the man 0n earth. He was now enjoying a comfortable life in the bosom of Abraham. Ah! Suddenly he changed his perspective.

Presto, in less than no time at all he saw life from a new vantage point . . . but it was too late. All of a sudden he understood how very insensitive he had been to poor Lazarus. O, the trauma of warped judgment in retrospect!

It is amazing how events like this can change our perspective. New York Mayor Giuliani, who had been vilified by many, has come to be respected.

David Letterman said, "If you've been watching and you're confused and depressed and irritated and angry and full of grief, and you don't know how to behave and you're not sure what to do, all you have to do is look at the Mayor . . . Rudolph Giuliani is the personification of courage." Letterman makes a living by making fun of everyone, including himself. Now he has shown a very human side of himself. Obviously, events like this bring out the best in us, even entertainers!

What a tragedy that it takes a tragedy to shock us into moral action. All of a sudden people are giving money and blood and food and clothing and whatever is needed. Yesterday they reported that 400 couples in Texas, who have been awaiting court hearings to approve their divorces, have cancelled those hearings!

And all of a sudden we are giving thought to priorities in entertainment. All of a sudden, politicians and corporations and the entertainment industry are giving consideration to how their products and images and ideas affect people. The Church has been trying for years to get them to think about their impact on children, with little success.

A new movie, "Collateral Damage," about terrorism, was due out next Friday. It has been put on the shelf indefinitely. Target Stores took the violent video games off their shelves the day after the attack.

Why did it take such a catastrophe to accomplish what good judgment should have dictated long ago? TIME magazine noted, "On a normal day we value heroism because it is so uncommon. On September 11 we valued heroism because it was everywhere."

I must have told you about our nationwide "People for Better TV" campaign and the thousands of signatures we collected and sent to the FCC, which were ignored by the new administration. Maybe now they will reconsider.

It took a trip to hell to effect some serious thinking by the rich man in the parable of Jesus. Did it take the hell of 911 (September 11) to induce serious thinking by us? Are we more serious about life and the complexities of interfaith relationships now? Do we see any contiguity between the rich man's apathy for the poor and our current situation? The Muslim countries, I think without exception, resent us not because we have so much, but because we use what we have for only our own luxurious lifestyle; we even exploit poor countries.

If Jesus were to speak to us on a mountainside today, what would he say? Would he, instead of using Lazarus, use Third-World countries as victims-to-become-victors? Have we rich Americans ignored the poor at our gate? Worse than that, have our large corporations actually exploited them? You know the answer! We need to take today's Gospel seriously. Our national arrogance and indifference is said to be a primary source of the hatred by those who become terrorists.

As I have talked, fellowshipped and prayed with Muslims these past couple of weeks, I have been profoundly impressed by their sincere commitment to peace and justice.

Two weeks ago I quoted a Muslim definition of jihad: "a holy war on behalf of Islam as a religious duty." A better definition was brought to my attention by one of the imams. He says that Jihad, which literally means "struggle," is used primarily to emphasize the struggle involved in mastering one's passions in an effort to lead a virtuous life.

Mohammed apparently said, after a military struggle, "We have returned from the lesser jihad to the greater jihad," by which he referred to the struggle for personal moral victory. The "lesser jihad" of militarism is like our Christian concept of a "just war" rationale. The imams have condemned terrorism. Specifically, they have pointed out that the Koran and Muslim tradition teach peace.

It also teaches that God is very harsh with those who suicide. I saw this first hand when a Muslim friend's son committed suicide. Mohammed said, "Whoever kills himself with a knife will spend eternity in hell stabbing himself in the stomach." So suicide bombers must consider their motives carefully. If their motive is to become martyrs for the sake of justice, that's hard to criticize.

Are they martyrs or monsters? Dying for a cause you love is martyrdom. Many Christians became martyrs thru the centuries as they died for the cause they loved. Is that what terrorists do? Or do they die for a cause based on hate? How can anyone hate with such passion as to die for that hate?

They apparently believe they will be immediately taken to heaven, where Allah will bestow many gifts and rewards on them. But Sheik Abdul Aziz al-Sheik, Saudi Arabia's grand mufti, has called the suicide bombers "illegitimate and have nothing to do with jihad in the cause of God."

If the terrorists were Muslims, they were apparently not good Muslims. My Muslim friends look at those terrorists like we look at Timothy McVeigh, not the least bit authentic. He saw himself as a soldier, fighting for the good of humankind. We saw him a misguided mental case!

In the interest of honesty, we must ask how candidly does Islam proclaim and promote justice? Is there religious freedom in any Muslim country? Do women and minorities enjoy equality? That to me is the crucial question.

But as I criticize countries that discriminate against women and minorities, I remember that women have been able to vote here in America for less than a century. And I remember that blacks and indians have suffered discrimination for most of our national history.

I am committed to the ideal of democracy and equality. I am committed to the ideal of righteousness, justice.

Amos was in the minority, but he was a faithful prophet. Jesus was in the minority, but he is our example. Paul was in the minority, but look what he accomplished for the Kingdom.

Dear saints, I do not want to be simplistic. We have suffered a disaster, and we will be many generations healing. But we must be on the healing side of the situation if we are to be faithful Christians.

That means we will pray not for revenge, retaliation, but for healing. As Christians, we must follow the dictum of our Leader, which in no way leaves us the option of vengeance. And . . . in no way is it an easy matter.

It may help to remember that the meltdown of the Trade Center Towers and the incineration of innocent life may only have been possible because we provided bin Laden and his associates with skills, weapons, money and obsessions back in the 80s. In our long conflict with the Soviets we trained and equipped Afghan fighters, including bin Laden, and then abandoned them! Just as the Kurds were abandoned after the Gulf War. As the Lebanese were abandoned and left homeless after we carved out a home for Israel.

It may also help to remember that during the Reagan era we bombed Libya, during the Bush era we bombed Iraq, during the Clinton days we bombed Sudan, all to "send a message" to terrorists! And remember, in Vietnam we used napalm and cluster bombs on peasant villages. And don't forget that we supported and trained death squads for Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala and Haiti.

Have we considered our behavior during the past century, and its impact on Muslim attitudes? Have we put our wealth in juxtaposition to their poverty?

Are we willing to look honestly at our record? President Jimmy Carter said in 1989: "We have only to go to Lebanon, to Syria, to Jordan, to witness firsthand the intense hatred among many people for the United States, because we bombed and shelled and unmercifully killed totally innocent villagers, women and children and farmers and housewives, in those villages around Beirut . . . As a result, we have become a kind of Satan in the minds of those who are deeply resentful. That is what precipitated the taking of hostages and that is what has precipitated some terrorist attacks."

Our president said that years ago. It seems even more relevant today than it was in 1989.

During the Civil War, General Sherman justified the burning of crops and the bombardment of Southern cities: "We are not only fighting hostile armies but a hostile people [who must be made] to feel the hard hand of war." I suspect the majority of Northerners approved. I question that very many Southerners approved!

In 1996 Madeline Albright, then U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, was asked on national television how she felt about the 500,000 Iraqi children who had died as a result of sanctions on which the U.S. insisted. She said it was "a very hard choice" but "we think the price is worth it." The sanctions remain; children are still dying!

The ambassador did not deny the connection between the sanctions and the deaths, as some others would like to do! Certainly the Iraqi government is corrupt, but does that justify our hate-inspired reaction?

Howard Zinn reminds us that when a crime is committed by someone who lives in a neighborhood, we don't destroy the whole neighborhood!

Of course, war and terrorism differ. In war, the potential victims have been warned that they are at risk. But in terrorism there is usually an absence of authorship. This attack has no stated purpose, so we don't know yet how to prevent further attacks. No one knows who's who. The smoke from the towers has become a smoke screen which so far blocks our view.

They have changed the geography and demography forever. We Christians must demonstrate the Gospel of a Jesus who, as George MacCloud says, "was not crucified in a cathedral between two candles, but on a cross between two thieves; on the town garbage heap." And it happened "at a crossroads so cosmopolitan they had to write his title in Hebrew, Latin and Greek (or should we say English, Japanese and Arabic?) at the kind of place where cynics talk smut, and thieves curse, and soldiers gamble."

Life is composed of good and evil, and we are each and all a mixture! No one of us is all good or all evil. I wish we could somehow learn lessons from this trauma. The "healing of the nations" must be a higher priority than "justice," which is our euphemism for reciprocation, retaliation.

We must continually ask what Jesus would do -- would he take revenge? We must not respond to violence with violence. Bishop Gumbleton points out that "Ultimately there is no defense against the bitter fruits of injustice." He asks, "Are those who did these horrendous acts of terror Ôfaceless cowards'? Are they mad men? Or must we face the reality that there are profound grievances among oppressed people that move them to rage and violence against us?"

Does America seek punishment rooted in justice, or vengeance rooted in hate? We here today need to enter this new era as Christians. No easy task!

In summary, I suggest we seriously consider the matter of values. The rich man in the parable considered only his own values, and they were definitely not the values of Christ's Kingdom!

Jesus was explicit in describing his values. If we are to be legitimate followers of his way, we must adopt those values. "I came that you might have life more abundantly." Then when he added "Love your neighbor as you love yourself" he implicitly told me that I must value the abundant life for my neighbor every bit as highly as I value the abundant life for myself.

When Jesus preached his inaugural sermon in his hometown, he made very clear what were to be the priorities of his ministry. "to preach good news to the poor . . . to proclaim freedom for prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour."

Can you see how relevant that is in today's parable story?

Then consider his description of those who will be invited into his eternal Kingdom: "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me."

Can you see the relevance of that to the story of the rich man?

Dear saints, I have no respect for the values which motivated the Trade Center bombers. I have no respect for any values which are forced, coerced. Jesus espoused a high set of values, values in stark contrast to those values, in stark contrast to the values of the establishment in his day . . . and in our day.

But Jesus never forced his values. He offered them as alternatives to those of the prevailing society. I maintain he does the same today. Never did Jesus coerce those who came to him. He invited them, implored them, loved them.

Today we face a crisis in values. Martin Luther King, Jr. "The choice is no longer between violence and non-violence; it is a choice between non-violence and non-existence."

If we respond with violence, we may expect more disasters, more terrorist attacks. Sisters and brothers, I beg you to give this serious consideration, and then to speak up, loud and clear.

Let us not permit the terrorists to turn us into mirror images of themselves. Rather, let us permit Jesus to turn us into reflections of his image.

Let us pray . . .

Lord, we rejoice today that E J has taken a giant step in his walk with you and with us. We rejoice that Teddy has been dedicated to you. We rejoice that we live in unity and love. Thank you for this beautiful world, and for the colors of this season.

May our lives reflect your love in all our relationships. Father, we recognize you are the giver of all good and perfect gifts, all we have, and all we are. Teach us to make our priorities reflect the kind of nobility to which you have called us.

Keep our courage high and help us to throttle our despair in the face of world conditions. Make us friends of the needy and companions of those who hurt.

May we remember that he who spoke still speaks, and he who came still comes.

Lord Jesus Christ, light of the world, fill our souls with your peace, fill our minds with your truth, fill our hearts with your love.

For all your gifts, we thank you in the name of Jesus, who taught us to pray:

Our Father who art in heaven,

Hallowed be thy name.

Thy kingdom come,

Thy will be done on earth,

as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our sins,

as we forgive those

who sin against us.

And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from evil:

For thine is the kingdom,

and the power, and the glory,

for ever.

Amen.