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CROWN THY GOOD WITH BROTHERHOOD A lot of people doubt that we would all come together now if this country were attacked today as it was twenty-one years ago. They may have forgotten, or never learned, how angry the country still was ten months after the 2000 Presidential election. And it only gets more opinionated and divided all the time. We are going to keep last year’s Grieving Angel at the top of every memorial page. Because it is the anger — not the different opinions and beliefs — that threaten our country. In a nation conceived in unity and dedicated to brotherhood, hatred and division are also kinds of death. This year’s memorial highlights a collage of videos to remind us of how powerful we are when we embrace without judging. That is the way to true liberation and healing. That is the resounding lesson of 9/11 — and the greatest way to honor the sacrifice of that day. The only way we will ever forge an ever more perfect union is to first recognize and celebrate how beautiful America already is and how good it always has been. United, we then can and will “mend our every flaw.” So help us God…
In 1893. the country was still recovering from the horrendous trauma of the Civil War. That summer, Katherine Lee Bates, a teacher from the East, wrote the words to “America the Beautiful” after climbing Pike’s Peak in the Colorado Rockies. Her inspiration was the majestic vista all around as she stood on what is, moving from east to west, the highest peak in the country. These are the refrains to the four most traditionally sung of the eight stanzas: America! America! God shed his grace on thee. And crown thy good with brotherhood; From sea to shining sea! After 9/11, a disarming spirit of generosity and reconciliation was all around. The anger and cynicism that had been so deep and prevalent just vanished. People felt connected to each other and people felt connected to God:
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