Ground Zero memorial conveys sense of grief, response of solidarity, Pope says at interfaith service
September 25, 2015
During an interfaith prayer service at Ground Zero on September 25, Pope Francis remarked that “grief is palpable” at the site of the terrorist attack on New York. But he also observed that the city had responded to the tragedy with “a powerful solidarity born of mutual support, love, and self-sacrifice.”
At Ground Zero, the Pope said, we mourn the “victims of a mindset which knows only violence, hatred, and revence—a mindset which can only cause pain, suffering, destruction and tears.”
However the Pope went on to say that he had met with the families of police officers and firefighters who died trying to save others in the World Trade Center towers. Speaking in Spanish, he said that the memorial also provides “a palpable sense of the heroic goodness which people are capable of, those hidden reserves of strength from which we can draw.” The Pontiff welcomed the participation of Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, and Sikh religious leaders at the service. By joining in prayer, he said, they showed a “shared desire to be a force for reconciliation, peace and justice in this community and throughout the world.”
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Further information:
- Pope Francis’ address at Ground Zero Memorial in New York (Vatican Radio)
- Pope Francis, at World Trade Center, Condemns Fanaticism (New York Times)
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