Tomorrow is the lamentable twenty-fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks perpetrated by Islamic terrorists in New York, Washington, D.C, and Shanksville, PA. The terrorists commandeered commercial airplanes to crash into buildings and kill many Americans on that fateful day.
Much has transpired in twenty-five years since the attack, and the resolve of a nation to sustain a society moving towards a more virtuous environment isn’t one of them. Virtue, once esteemed as a goal for individuals to strive for, is often mocked or ignored as a character flaw for the ever-evolving progressive person.
At the time of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the majority of Americans recoiled at the sheer horror and violence that ensued. Today, a big portion of the populace views murder and violence as acceptable and encouraged if certain social and political conditions warrant it. The assassination of Charlie Kirk was cheered as a favor to the radicals who wanted to silence a man speaking about virtue and traditional values.
The cult of death also supported and excused a cold-blooded killer who shot a healthcare executive to death. Somehow, in the minds of the dark left, Hamas had the right to kill over 2500 people, including small children and infants. Just recently, the majority of the jury wanted to acquit a mother who strangled her three small children to death. Abortion at the moment of birth doesn’t turn heads in disgust but is applauded as an enhancement of civilization and women’s rights.
On the country’s current path, these will not be the only examples because virtue, what was once the cornerstone of American society, is replaced by narcissism and victimhood. The younger generation who did not experience the 9/11 attacks may have been told about the events of that tragic day. Still, they have not been taught about the individuals taken from them that day who exhibited virtue in their final moments. Their stories should be told as a lesson for our young students, rather than the sanitized facts and biased recounting of ‘oppressed’ people who were forced to take such action, as is often passed on as history today.
Stories about three women on 9/11 should be told and remembered solely for the virtue these women showed at the moment of their death. Think about it: at the moment these women knew they were going to die, they did not fall into a selfish concern for themselves, but their actions revealed how strong their moral compasses were.
A young woman in her late twenties, Elizabeth Wainio, was returning from an exciting trip to Europe to attend a wedding in Florence, Italy. She then traveled to Paris, entered a church, and lit a candle in memory of her grandmother, who influenced her throughout her life. Her trip to Paris mattered to her, and she later said that visiting the capital would make her life complete. No one could have imagined at the time that these words would prove prophetic for her.
Days later, Wainio returned to the U.S. and boarded Flight 93 in Newark, NJ, headed for San Francisco on a business trip. At 9:28 AM, her situation changed dramatically because it was known that the flight had been hijacked. At 9:53 AM, she contacted her stepmother on an airphone, realizing that her life would end soon. Instead of thinking about herself, she was focused on the plight of those she loved who would have to live with the loss. In what must have been complete terror, Elizabeth focused on comforting her loved ones above her own concerns. She reiterated her love to those who would be left and said she would be with the grandmother she had prayed for just days earlier in a church in Paris. At 10:03 AM, Flight 93 crashed into the earth in Pennsylvania, killing all aboard.
Madeleine Amy Sweeny, a flight attendant, a young wife, and mother of two small children, took an extra shift to help her ill colleague on September 11, a decision that would profoundly affect her family and others. At 7:15 AM, aboard the flight, she called her husband and told him she loved him. Approximately fourteen minutes into the flight, she knew something was wrong.
She made another in-flight call to American Airlines manager Michael Woodward, describing the terrifying events taking place on the plane. Her last words: “I see water. I see buildings…Oh my God, we are flying way too low. Oh my God!” Her courageous call informed authorities of critical information about the hijacking before the plane went into the Twin Towers.
On the same flight, fellow attendant Betty Ong also used the air phone and alerted authorities with more details about the hijacking. She related that two other flight attendants were seriously injured, along with reporting that a business-class man’s throat was slashed, and the cockpit was breached and the pilots murdered. Both she and Sweeny told authorities the terrorists’ seat numbers, which later were used to identify the terrorists. Her last words before the plane crashed were, “Pray for us. Pray for us.”
On the twenty-fifth anniversary, let us not forget the courage these women had in the face of their own imminent deaths. They should be an example for all of us of a sober reality: that goodness will prevail over evil, but not without cost. This is what the young should be hearing in school, not the drivel of perceived oppression.