Defining heroes
Millions around the world remember the heroes of Flight 93. Like a super psychic magnet for the warrior spirit the small ramshackle folk hero memorial near Shanksville forms a testament to the human hunger after real, genuine, folk heroes. Keep away the vain, photo-staged politicians who parody themselves alone on the pre-arranged decks of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers parked safely 1,000 yards from its home docks. No thank you Mr. Bush. Real American souls hunger after heroic actions like a faithful wife hungers after her sailor’s safe return to shore. No less, no more.
Certain kinds of displayed gallantry have fallen out of date both on and off the world’s battlefields. Machine guns and drone assassins have taken care of abolishing military honor, killing your sons and daughters before they can lift a hand in their own self-defense. Honor has been replaced by horror. A kind of mind-numbing nightly media body count that counts for nothing but premature death of the innocent.
But just when you thought America’s honor was dying a technologically-enforced death, along came the Heroes of Flight 93 and a moral rebirth for the justification for a spontaneous violent counterattack – without the confidence of firearms, not even a knife, and a few brave, ordinary men came forth in a rush beyond the patriotic feelings of July 4 and showed the life gained in dying a hero’s death. Self-sacrifice of their kind shall not, must never be forgotten, so that we shall be inspired to human freedom in the face of technological terror. Now, you may look with faith at the man sitting next to you at the Little League ball game, or even across from you at the red light. He could be hero if the circumstances demanded it.
To these men of Flight 93, ordinary men, this decade and decades of Americans to come owe a debt of extra-ordinary gratitude, because they did the right thing without orders from a timid, career-concerned government bureaucrat or two-faced pol.
Theirs was no ordinary death, though they had lived decent, law-abiding, ordinary lives up to that fateful moment of total concentrated heroic effort. Their death was one of demonic design made ready by the evil intellect of terrorists. Did they all not overcome that obstacle we all must overcome – fear? By so doing they placed the fate of their souls in the hands of God, who through these mortal deeds proved to one and all that we need not be afraid if such men as those on Flight 93 were not afraid in the face of the enemy of freedom-foreign and domestic.
Why cannot our own military and civilian police behave more like the Heroes of Flight 93? That this kind of bravery prescribes in men an honest directness, sometimes far-reaching, like that of a migratory bird in flight, that in its journey of faith never heeds when it finds itself crossing over into unchartered territory, but fearlessly follows God’s urging defeating the fear created by the evil intellect of faithless men, should give us all pause to say, “I am equal to that.”
S. Raymond Pohaski
Uniontown
More to war than weapons
I would like to share my support of President Bush for his being man with courage and character that we in middle America appreciate. We support our troops who gave so much to help the people be free in Iraq. I get upset that all people dwell on is the weapons of mass destruction. I agree that we may not have found or proved all that we were looking for, but I also believe that they had plenty of time to move or destroy this material.
I feel we had all the reason to liberate the people who desire freedom in Iraq or any country that is ruled by a dictator. People are dying to get into America and not trying to leave. I would like to also challenge those who talk against America that they have the freedom to move to a country of their choice. I believe in freedom of speech and all the freedoms that we enjoy.
I do not like people who hate America and are trying to change it into a godless society as many are. Please take your stand and continue with our forefathers, one nation under God, with liberty and justice for all.
Jim Hickle
Grace Ministry
Uniontown