Reviews for Searching for God at Ground Zero

The average rating for Searching for God at Ground Zero based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2017-06-06 00:00:00 Steve Bellows This is a slim book, and one of the author's earlier books, but well worth searching for. It covers his time visiting the site of WTC 9/11 terrorist attack in New York, from 2 days after until start of October (he didn't go every day, partly to be able to do his job as a Catholic magazine editor and also to have some mental breaks I'm sure). What he found was not so much discoragement and despair - though sad moments happen - but more moments of charity, hope and grace - God's presence through Holy Spirit. He worked among rescue workers as a priest, taking often some other priests with him there (fellow Jesuits and others). The spirit of the place was found in people's charity, generosity; the volunteers, the people who had come from other places, the drawings of children, the food and other things given to workers... a sense of community working for the common good, of peace. Not something the hijackers had, no matter what their mouths repeated in their last moments; just chaos. There's many striking moments: the togetherness felt when having a noonday meal on a boat; the Gospel said during one Mass which talked of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin parables - the searching God, the searching workers, those who ran into the towers to rescue; the humility hidden in the 'not doing enough' feeling many had though they were doing quite a lot; then there's the pig ribs: one worker had found them among the debris - fell down from (and with) the Windows Of The World restaurant! Eventually things change: chaos becomes more organised as things like plans for what will be done to fix some savabale buildings, the cleaning, the taking away of the building remains like beams happen. Things will be fixed and cleaned, new people will do that, and life will go on. So the time for the author to be needed, to be there, is also over. But it has been a good experience for him, and makes a good reading for us. He thinks of his father who had died of cancer 2 months before this event - when he sees groups of relatives coming to visit the place where their loved one(s) perished - and he remembers the pain yet also the grace that was then, and now here. The question of 'why God allows suffering?' comes up, and the author thinks of the Passion, and how through Jesus God really does know what's it's like to be a suffering human. The question may not have a clear answer on this side of death, but the hope and comfort and people who care are here, and through them, God. A dove is one day seen briefly resting on the rubble. A white one; even flying away, it can be a sign, a symbol of the Holy Spirit present, even in a place which shows the reality of evil. There is death, but there is and will be LIFE too.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-08-01 00:00:00 TImo Koepe Father James Martin's reflections of his time with the rescue workers at the World Trade Center for about four weeks after 9/11. Very moving.