September 6, 2011

CHICAGO – A commemoration of "Prayer and Remembrance" will take place Sept. 11, 2011, at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in New York City to acknowledge the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks in the United States that day. Holy Trinity is a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson and the Rev. Stephen P. Bouman, executive director of ELCA Congregational and Synodical Mission, will offer reflections at the commemoration.

Hosted by Lutheran Social Services of New York, the commemoration invites members of the faith community to worship in unity, remember lives lost and acknowledge survivors who are moving forward.

Special features of the service include the liturgy, commissioned immediately after the attacks, and music by Joelle Wallach, who composed the song "The Fireman's Prayer." Lutheran Disaster Response will host a reception following the service.

"We had watched in horror from our 16th-floor office windows as both towers (of the World Trade Center) lit up, and then fell into a cloud of smoke and ash," recalls Bouman, who was bishop of the ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod at the time of the attacks.

Bouman said the anniversary of the attacks in New York, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C., recalls a "time of unspeakable suffering, fear and sadness. It was also a time of deep spiritual solidarity."

Other ELCA congregations across New York are also commemorating the anniversary.

At their Sept. 11 worship, members of Grace Lutheran Church in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., will use a processional cross created from a beam belonging to one of the World Trade Center buildings. The cross was designed by a firefighter serving on site the day of the attacks.

Members of Oceanside Lutheran Church in Oceanside, N.Y., will participate in a memorial peace walk that includes stops at houses of worship in Oceanside. An interfaith memorial service will follow.

Redeemer Lutheran Church in Flushing, N.Y., will hold an ecumenical service in the morning. The service will be held in partnership with El Shaddai Christian Church and Grace Presbyterian Church there. Following worship, relatives of victims and survivors of the tragedy will share their memories.

ELCA News Service