9/11 Tribute - "City of ruins" Bruce Springsteen

9/11 Prayer..."Life is short"

I first heard this prayer at church in the days and weeks after 9/11/01...it will be a central part of my sermon on Sunday...

Life is short,

And we do not have much time

To gladden the hearts of those

Who travel the way with us.

So be swift to be kind,

And as we go,

May the blessing, the love,

the joy, and the peace

Of the Holy One

Who is in the midst of us

Be among you and remain with you

Always.

Amen

(adapted from the French Poet Henri Amiel)

9/11 Tribute

Something is amiss

“One cannot be aware both of the history of Christian war and of the contents of the gospels without feeling that something is amiss.”

- Wendell Berry, from his introduction to Blessed are the Peacemakers

It is not the critic who counts

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. 



~Teddy Roosevelt, 1910, Paris