I Remember
I remember I was 47 years old playing golf with my young son. Coming into the club house, this was being broadcast on the television… I think he remembers too. He must have been around 14 years old.
I wonder how those born since 1996 know and feel about this day, having not been born yet or very young. I hope they have been well educated. And did you hear about the political commentator, Hasan Piker, who made the statement that “America deserved 9/11… What a fool. A dark forbidden part of my soul wonders how he would feel had his wife and children been on United Airlines flight 93 that day.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
The Story
Osama bin Laden led al-Qaeda, a group built on the belief that religion and government should never be separate — that the Middle East should be ruled strictly by Sharia law, full stop. He saw U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia and American support for Israel as proof the West was waging war on Islam, and he used that belief to justify terrorism, including the killing of civilians. His ideology rejected religious pluralism outright: no equal footing for other faiths, no room for secular government.
America’s founding ran in the opposite direction. Its framers deliberately separated church from state, built government on the consent of the governed, and enshrined freedom of religion and equality under the law in the Constitution. Where bin Laden’s worldview treated one religious interpretation as the only legitimate basis for law, the American system was designed to keep any single faith from controlling the state at all. The clash between these two visions — religious law versus secular pluralism, and violence versus consent as the basis for legitimacy — is really the core of what made bin Laden frame this as a civilizational war rather than a political dispute.
By any measure, bin Laden was evil.
The Fruit
Here’s a quote I heard a long time ago that I’ve used regularly to judge people’s character, situations and ideals. It comes from Matthew 7:16, “…ye shall know them by their fruits”
America isn’t perfect, but I’d rather eat the fruit here under our Constitution and morals than eat the fruit being served at the table of the likes of Osama bin Ladin and other “Supreme Leaders” who enforce Sharia law.
I Remember, We Remember
I’m fortunate to live in St. Louis, USA where every 5 years flags are planted for every soldier and first responder who have died in the war against terror. This year there are seven thousand one hundred and sixty flags planted on Art Hill in Forest Park. Let’s not fight among ourselves when there are forces outside of America just dying to take away our freedom and kill us.
Feeling solemn,
Mike
Ps. I welcome your comments below.