Saturday, September 15, 2001
You didn't need a church - many people simply met with their fellow employees at work
Roanoke Valley services are held to remember, grieve and overcome

"Confess to God exactly what we would like to do, even if it means our desire to tear somebody limb from limb."

By CODY LOWE
THE ROANOKE TIMES

   Friday was officially a day of prayer and remembrance, another day of tears for America.

    But for Trena Moore - and thousands, perhaps millions, like her - it was also a day of hope.

    Out of disaster and terror, Moore believes, will arise a closer, more faithful nation.

    She thinks most of the people who died in Tuesday's terrorist attacks would be like her: "I believe ... that if I had died, I'd be in heaven looking down and thinking 'something good is going to come out of this.'"

    Moore and a group of her co-workers from Internal Medicine Associates walked up the street to join a crowd at Second Presbyterian Church on Mountain Avenue for a noon service that was mirrored in houses of worship throughout the nation.

    Eagerly complying with President Bush's proclamation of a national day of prayer, people throughout Western Virginia heard services that included messages such as the one delivered by the Rev. George Anderson at Second Presbyterian.

    Reading numerous passages from the Bible's book of Psalms, Anderson reminded the worshippers that those Scriptures "give us permission to lay it all before God ... to confess to God exactly what we would like to do, even if it means our desire to tear somebody limb from limb."

    Ultimately, however, while it is the task of human beings to assure that justice is done, final vengeance is God's, he said, and the world is in God's hands.

    Pastor Emeritus William Klein offered a prayer for the day, based in part on one he prepared a decade ago on the eve of the Persian Gulf War.

    Asking God's blessings on the slain, the injured, their families and caretakers, Klein said, "We pray for peace with hearts hardly capable of imagining the horrors of war in this dreadful age, yet wanting peace desperately, not just for ourselves but for all who inhabit thy earth. ...

    "You will continue to hear our pleas for peace, O God, even as our world is further plunged into darkness. And if it must be that demonic hatreds and inhuman terrorisms can only be brought down through the clash of arms, give to us the victory, God of battles, and grant that we have the will to make whatever sacrifices, both personal and national, needed to end the insanity that would crush the innocent."

    He concluded with a supplication for God to "open our hearts to that new and better future thou dost yearn to give, when Christians, Moslems and Jews, together with all people thou hast created, may honor each other and live in peace."

    Across town on Salem Turnpike, the congregation of Masjid AnNur Islamic Center, Roanoke's mosque, met for regular Friday worship at 1:30.

    An informal survey of the 25 or so worshippers found no one who had experienced any negative reactions because of their faith.

    Still the persistent identification of those suspected of carrying out the attacks as "Islamic terrorists" bothered Dr. Naiyer Imam, who worshipped at the mosque Friday.

    "I hope people will realize that these extremists have nothing to do with Islam," Imam said.

    "We hope as much as anybody else that they catch the culprits and put an end to this. I hope we get cooperation from all Muslim countries" to stop such terrorism, Imam said.

    Although Muslims in some bigger cities, including New York, have suffered attacks or threats since the terrorism, "I am happy locally that people have been understanding," Imam said.

    Peter Mullen, a Salem Catholic who helped initiate prayers for safety on Interstate 81 after a series of deadly accidents a couple of years ago, visited the mosque Friday afternoon. He and his daughter wanted to attend services to express their solidarity with the congregation, he said.

    Houses of worship were not the only places people took time out Friday to remember and pray. Many simply met with their fellow employees at work.

    Workers spilled out of Roanoke's federal building at noon Friday and joined "Hands Around the Poff Building." The chain made it about three-quarters of the way around the building, which is on Franklin Road.

    General Electric employees gathered in their company parking lot. Botetourt County workers met outside the courthouse in Fincastle. Employees of The Roanoke Times congregated in the mailroom.

    Still, many craved the atmosphere of a sacred space to join in the national spirit of grief and determination.

    Ken Potter picked up his children - Philip, 12; Amy, 10; and Tim, 9 - from school so they could attend the service at Second Presbyterian with him.

    "I'm just trying to do what I can to come to terms with what happened." It was great, he said, that people across the country got together regardless of religion to show their support of one another, of the victims of the attacks and of the government.

    Stacy Cochran was one of the Internal Medicine Associates employees who walked to Second Presbyterian:

    "Love, peace, sisterhood, brotherhood. When you get those together, there's nothing we can't accomplish."

    Staff writer Jen McCaffery contributed to this report.

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