Articles

Some years ago , I hand-carried a friend's family Bible, chock full of history, to her relatives in England. She wanted to make sure the record of events would not be lost.

Since the terrorist attacks in the United States on September 11, I've been more aware of a distinct connection between two different longings—the longing for community, and the longing for communion with a higher power. I began to think about the connection when I got my hair cut a few days after the attacks.

Growing up in an area where religion wasn't discussed much in school, I was unprepared for the theological conversations I encountered when I went to college. Religion was a major topic of conversation at mealtime and during other informal gatherings.

Is God up in heaven, a long way off from us here on earth? That's what I thought when I was a child. I pictured God as a grandfatherly type, sitting on a throne up in the sky.

Like many other countries , Germany has been affected by last year's events in New York and Washington. Many of us who live in Germany have American friends, and so we are touched by what happened.

In a deep sense, every thought and writing and utterance and form must be revolutionary. It must attempt to give expression to the everlasting discontent with everything that is—a discontent that distinguishes the human being from the beast—it must attempt to change human life, the personal and the social.

Paul Tillich , among the greatest Christian theologians of the 20th century, wrote 112 pieces for the "Voice of America," to be broadcast into Nazi Germany between March 1942 and May 1944. A few years ago, manuscripts of these broadcasts were collected, translated, and published under the title Against the Third Reich.

Several commentators have mentioned that September 11 of last year reminded them of the attacks on Pearl Harbor of 50 years ago. There are some similarities in the posturing and in the excessive attitudes of hate and revenge.

On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants took over the United States Embassy in Tehran, holding over 60 Americans hostage. That event was as astonishing in its time as the terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington, D.

September 11, when subways shut down and all streets were closed on Manhattan Island, thousands of people were left stranded, often with little money and no way to get home. The deserted bridges—the Brooklyn, Manhattan, the Williamsburg, and others—were soon filled with people who had to walk home—sometimes a journey of many miles.