My friend John called that morning while I was still at home, getting ready to go to a meeting we were having with some colleagues.
No, I hadn’t been listening to the radio, I replied to his concerned question. He said I better and he assumed we would still have the meeting, but the world might be changing.
An hour later I was sitting with John and a handful of others in a conference room in Oak Brook, Illinois. We were signing the contracts to start construction of Everest Academy, Lemont. And all of us had listened to the news on the way to our meeting and were aware that a plane had hit the World Trade Center.
At that point, the world was still trying to sort out what had happened, let alone who did it or why. Planes across America had been grounded, and it was eerie to sit in an office in the Chicago suburbs and see no planes on their way to and from O’Hare and Midway.
We did our business, only learning later that while we were making plans to build a school, thousands were dying in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. We later learned that what might have been a horrible accident was a disgusting act of horror, terror and war.
That was 12 years ago. Today, the school is a reality and more than 200 students are learning in a truly Catholic environment. They are receiving that wonderful, balanced approach to education that we call “integral formation” – human, intellectual, apostolic, spiritual. The school is a beautiful story of faith and determination.
In the 12 years since that fateful day, America has fought wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thousands of soldiers and civilians have been wounded or killed. Neither country has blossomed into a Jeffersonian Democracy.
We are having a national debate about whether to fire missiles at a Mideast tyrant to punish him for using chemical weapons to kill more than 1,000 of his own people in Syria. This debate comes after more than 100,000 have died in the civil war in that sad nation, with millions forced to flee and living in squalid refugee camps.
When Richard Nixon resigned from the Presidency in 1974, he spoke to the nation from the Oval Office. After admitting mistakes and explaining his intention to leave, he spent a few minutes recalling the successes he had as President (even at the most dire times, a real politician can recount his victories). One thing he proudly claimed was progress toward a true and lasting peace in the Middle East.
The many subsequent wars and acts of terror suggest his claim was a bit premature.
I’m not smart nor wise enough to figure out what to do about the conflict in the Middle East. Unfortunately, I don’t think there is anyone in Washington, Moscow, Paris, London or the United Nations who has any better ideas than I have.
But there is a holy man in Rome, Pope Francis, who offers me the only path that brings confidence and comfort: prayer and faith. That is my plan today, my plan for hope and a future where peace finds a way.
This plan can’t work any worse that what others have tried.
