Holy Cross - September 14

This feast is called in Greek "Raising Aloft of the Precious Cross". In Latin it is called Exaltatio Sanctae Crucis (literally, "Raising Aloft of the Holy Cross". In some parts of the Anglican Communion the feast is called Holy Cross Day, a name also used by Lutherans.

The discovery of the True Cross in 326 by Saint Helena, the mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine I (venerated in the Eastern Church as Saint Constantine) during a pilgrimage she made to Jerusalem. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was then built at the site of the discovery, by order of Helena and Constantine. The church was dedicated nine years later, with a portion of the cross placed inside it. In 614, that portion of the cross was carried away from the church by the Persians, and remained missing until it was recaptured by the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius in 628. The cross was returned to the church the following year after initially having been taken to Constantinople by Heraclius.

The date used for the feast marks the dedication of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 335. This was a two-day festival: although the actual consecration of the church was on September 13, the cross itself was brought outside the church on September 14 so that the clergy and faithful could pray before the True Cross, and all could come forward to venerate it.

The celebration is sometimes called Feast of the Glorious Cross.

 

Early in the morning on September 11, 2001, nineteen hijackers took control of four commercial airliners en route to San Francisco and Los Angeles from Boston, Newark, and Washington, D.C. (Washington Dulles International Airport).  At 8:46 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 was crashed into the World Trade Center's North Tower, followed by United Airlines Flight 175 which hit the South Tower at 9:03 a.m. Another group of hijackers flew American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. A fourth flight, United Airlines Flight 93, whose ultimate target was thought to be either the United States Capitol or White House, crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania at 10:03 a.m, after the passengers on board engaged in a fight with the hijackers.

In total 2,974 victims and the 19 hijackers died in the attacks. The overwhelming majority of casualties were civilians, including nationals of over 90 different countries. In addition, the death of at least one person from lung disease was ruled by a medical examiner to be a result of exposure to dust from the World Trade Center's collapse.

The damage to the Pentagon was cleared and repaired within a year, and the Pentagon Memorial was built on the site. The rebuilding process has started on the World Trade Center site. In 2006 a new office tower was completed on the site of 7 World Trade Center. The 1 World Trade Center is currently under construction at the site and at 1,776 ft (541 m) upon completion in 2011, will become one of the tallest buildings in North America. Three more towers were originally expected to be built between 2007 and 2012 on the site.

In the days immediately following the attacks, many memorials and vigils were held around the world.  In addition, pictures were placed all over Ground Zero. A witness described being unable to "get away from faces of innocent victims who were killed. Their pictures are everywhere, on phone booths, street lights, walls of subway stations. Everything reminded me of a huge funeral, people quiet and sad, but also very nice. Before, New York gave me a cold feeling; now people were reaching out to help each other."

The Tribute in Light viewed from Jersey City on the anniversary of the attacks in 2004 (pictured above).

 

One of the first memorials was the Tribute in Light, an installation of 88 searchlights at the footprints of the World Trade Center towers which projected two vertical columns of light into the sky. In New York, the World Trade Center Site Memorial Competition was held to design an appropriate memorial on the site. The winning design, Reflecting Absence, was selected in August 2006, and consists of a pair of reflecting pools in the footprints of the towers, surrounded by a list of the victims' names in an underground memorial space.  Plans for a museum on the site have been put on hold, following the abandonment of the International Freedom Center in reaction to complaints from the families of many victims.

The Pentagon Memorial was completed and opened to the public on the seventh anniversary of the attacks, September 11, 2008.  It consists of a landscaped park with 184 benches facing the Pentagon.  When the Pentagon was repaired in 2001-2002, a private chapel and indoor memorial were included, located at the spot where Flight 77 crashed into the building.

At Shanksville, a permanent Flight 93 National Memorial is planned to include a sculpted grove of trees forming a circle around the crash site, bisected by the plane's path, while wind chimes will bear the names of the victims.  A temporary memorial is located 500 yards (457 m) from the crash site.  New York City firefighters donated a memorial to the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department. It is a cross made of steel from the World Trade Center and mounted atop a platform shaped like the Pentagon.  It was installed outside the firehouse on August 25, 2008.

Many other permanent memorials are being constructed elsewhere, and scholarships and charities have been established by the victims' families, along with many other organizations and private figures.

Join us for the next Town Hall Meeting on Sunday, September 13th immediately following Mass.  The Parish financial condition will be provided along with the Rector and Vestry's Vision for St. Thomas in 2010.  Please join us for this meeting that is expected to last no more than 45 minutes.  Your Vestry is providing the goodies!  All are welcome.

"take the whole armour of God... and having done all, to stand..." Ephesians 6:13
 
Our theme this year draws inspiration from the Pauline epistle to the Ephesians. The words for our annual 'motto' are taken from the sixth chapter.

 

Over and over again in this "Catholic Epistle" (Catholic in the sense that Ephesians gives us some of the most highly developed and mature visions of the "Universal Church") St Paul urges Christians to see themselves in the light of God's redeeming activity "in Christ"- and therefore you and I (all Christians as "the Body of Christ") are essential parts of 'the sacrament of intimate union with God and of unity for the whole human race.' So enthused is St Paul with conveying the vision of God's grace that he deploys various images to describe the Church Universal and the Church local (how we might view ourselves as the localand particular expression of the Universal Church): here are just a few of them from the Ephesian epistle:

 

We are 'one new person, one new humanity created to replace the division and enmity between Jew and Gentile in the old order' (chapter two verse fifteen). We are 'God's household' or 'family' (2:19) we are 'Christ's fullness (1:23) that which is filled by Christ, the present focus for, and medium of, His Presence.' We are to grow 'into and appropriate (4:13) that fullness' [pleroma in Greek]. 'The Church is Christ's Bride' (5:23-33) reminding us that 'in our intimate union with the exalted Christ we are to live holy lives,' since the goal of Christ's love for the Church in his sacrificial death is the presentation of that Bride to himself in glory and moral perfection. We are the 'New Temple with the exalted Christ as the keystone holding all together' and 'the Apostles and Prophets are the sure foundation' each individual believer playing our proper and crucial role as 'living bricks that are built and knit together into the Temple that is God's dwelling place in the Spirit (2:20-22).'
 
I hope that it is immediately apparent that this year we are meditating on the corporate nature of the Church and her expressions both universally and locally. St Paul is writing at a time when believers lacked depth in their understanding and appreciation of the dynamics and nature of the Church as the 'Body of Christ' (ten times that phrase is used in the short space of six chapters) and he 'boosts' the self-image of Christians (a confident realism rather than a naïve optimism) by describing our discipleship as 'part of the disclosure of the mystery of God's purpose for the entire world.'
 
In a time of great uncertainty about the future and how we will be able to cope with the myriad pressures that threaten us St Paul is reminding us to 'stand firm' to 'stand confidently' on Christ who is the Rock. In Ephesians there are seven founding unities from which believers may take courage (4:4-6) 'one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all.' 
                                                                                       

Fr. Ian Elliot Davies
 

 

Associate Rector

Missa Vigil hoc septem dies cum lingua Latina. Missa mos ineo 5 meridianus et cum ero Abeo Gregoriana in Ecclesiae Parochiae Sancta Thomasiensis.

[The Vigil Mass on Saturday will be in Latin this week.  Join us at 5pm in the Church with Gregorian Chant.]
 

Sophie's Choice is a novel by William Styron published in 1979. It concerns a young American Southerner, an aspiring writer, who befriends the Jewish Nathan Landau and his beautiful lover Sophie, a Polish (but non-Jewish) survivor of the Nazi concentration camps. An immediate bestseller and the basis of the 1982 successful film. 

 

Friday, September 18th join in a viewing of the film and a lively discussion afterwards.

At 6:30pm come enjoy a potluck supper sponsored by the St. Martin's Guild. The movie will begin promptly at 7:30pm.

Interesting facts about

St. Thomas the Apostle

 

St Thomas Website