Tears are optional.
Prayers are optional.
Flowers are optional.
Whatever you do or don't do to commemorate that day five years ago, know this:
Victory is not optional. It is required of us:
By our ancestors, who fought and died to make us free and keep us free. By our descendants, whose liberty or subjugation depends on what we do now. By the ideas and ideals that are, ultimately, our great strength. By the tragic sense that men and women have always known, except in times when they grew complacent and hedonistic and materialist, that evil exists and must be confronted. Not by trying to wish it out of existence, not by relying on words or negotiation or understanding. But confronted, and if possible defeated.
That is a hard lesson to learn. Let us hope that we do not need another event to learn it, perhaps too late -- an event more horrible than September 11, or watching our institutions designed to protect free minds dismantled by those who fear free minds.
Plant in our souls determination and power and the spiritual illumination to guide us, bravery to carry us through what we must go through.
Then, add flowers if you wish.
Prayers are optional.
Flowers are optional.
Whatever you do or don't do to commemorate that day five years ago, know this:
Victory is not optional. It is required of us:
By our ancestors, who fought and died to make us free and keep us free. By our descendants, whose liberty or subjugation depends on what we do now. By the ideas and ideals that are, ultimately, our great strength. By the tragic sense that men and women have always known, except in times when they grew complacent and hedonistic and materialist, that evil exists and must be confronted. Not by trying to wish it out of existence, not by relying on words or negotiation or understanding. But confronted, and if possible defeated.
That is a hard lesson to learn. Let us hope that we do not need another event to learn it, perhaps too late -- an event more horrible than September 11, or watching our institutions designed to protect free minds dismantled by those who fear free minds.
Plant in our souls determination and power and the spiritual illumination to guide us, bravery to carry us through what we must go through.
Then, add flowers if you wish.
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