From the WSJ Opinion Archives
HOUSES OF WORSHIP
A Day of Sacred Places
New York will mourn with bells, prayers, candles, chants and "interfaith" services.
Sirens sounded last Sept. 11. Bells will sound on this one.
Responding to a request by New York's mayor, Michael Bloomberg, churches across New York will ring their bells at 10:29 a.m., the exact minute when the World Trade Center's north tower fell. Along the Upper West Side, the ringing will begin before that, leading up to a citywide moment of silence at 8:46 a.m., when the first plane hit the Trade Center.
But bells are not the only way that New York's churches are commemorating the day's anniversary. At the Park Avenue Methodist Church, the Rev. Bill Shillady will start a prayer service at 8:30 a.m., on the busy 86th Street sidewalk outside his church. Passers-by can join the prayers or take one of 4,000 candles that will be handed out for lighting at some point during the day, "to push back the darkness."
Several houses of worship will replicate all or part of the secular ceremony that civic officials will hold at Ground Zero. The names of the 2,829 victims will be read at Park Avenue Methodist, and a morning service at the Fifth Avenue Synagogue will include a reading of the Gettysburg Address, as well as psalms, passages from Isaiah and the kel moleh, a traditional Hebrew prayer.
Other traditional ceremonies will also commemorate Sept. 11. Buddhist monks will chant in memory of World Trade Center victims at the Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art in the early afternoon. St. Patrick's Cathedral will hold its regular daily Masses, with a memorial Mass in the late afternoon.
The Islamic Center of New York will hold a prayer service, which will be open to the public. The New York Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints will open its three chapels for prayer throughout the day. Church members will hang American flags and play patriotic music in the church's main building.
Early in the day, the Port Authority will hold a closed service for its employees and the families of victims at Riverside Church, which is big enough to accommodate such a large gathering.
Mayor Bloomberg and Gov. George Pataki have asked churches to open their doors to provide sacred space to the public throughout the day next Wednesday. Many churches have taken this concept of openness one step further by planning interfaith services, a prominent feature of the commemorative events.
The Rev. Arthur Caliandro, of Marble Collegiate Church, is a co-chair of A Partnership of Faith, one group planning such a service this week. He explains that worshiping with those of other faiths helps people to transcend their differences, and "the walls begin to crumble."
Thus an Interfaith Service of Prayer, Remembrance, Hope and Restoration will take place the night of Tuesday, Sept. 10, at the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church. The program is described as a "trilogue"--or a three-way dialogue--among Imam Talib W. 'Abdur-Rashid of the Mosque of Islamic Brotherhood, Rabbi Peter Rubinstein of the Central Synagogue and the Rev. James A. Forbes Jr. of the Riverside Church. "There is a different kind of energy when three people are involved in a conversation," explains Mr. Caliandro.
At the Abyssinian Baptist Church there will be an interdenominational service on Sept. 11 sponsored by the Council of Churches of the City of New York, featuring Protestant, Greek Orthodox, Muslim, Catholic and Jewish clergy and their congregations. Archbishop Demetrios, whose archdiocese included little St. Nicholas Church, which was destroyed on Sept. 11, may offer one of the sermons.
Another interfaith service will begin at 6 p.m. on Wednesday at the Park Avenue Synagogue. As many as 2,000 worshipers are expected to come--Catholics, Methodists, Presbyterians and Jews, among others.
They will all go through metal detectors at the entrance.
Ms. Crowley is a Journal editorial page assistant.
