On September 11, 2001

(Where were you on 9/11/01?)

Well, it's an interesting thing to ask because many of us who go back as far as 1963 are asked the question, "Where were you when President Kennedy was shot?" We have that deeply ingrained in our brains, and I think this is going to be one of those cases. In Faculty Meeting this morning the Academic Dean made a comment to that effect that this is one of those things that will stay imprinted in your mind forever. It's kind of interesting the story of where I was, I was actually on the radio. I was being interviewed at WGEL, the competition down the street. In fact this evening I knew I was supposed to have an interview at a radio station, I actually went over there first. I walked in and the announcer said, “Well, hi Dr. Mannoia. How are you?” And I said “fine.” He said, “Can I help you?” And I said “Well I'm supposed to be on an interview.” He looked puzzled, and I said, “Well maybe.” So I looked at my palm pilot and it said WGRN so I said, “Whoops, wrong radio station.” But, I was sitting there as part of the auction that goes on every year for the pies for Relay for Life. I had baked a pie and it was being auctioned off and as I sat there, as I am sitting here with you right now, and the calls were coming in and the news was being read, I happened to look through the glass window, and I saw the TV monitor and I saw this plane literally go into the thing and my mouth fell open. And the interesting thing about that is that apparently the WGEL studios were also being taped in this auction and broadcast on channel 3, our public service channel. So many of my friends subsequently told me that they were actually watching me as I was being interviewed and actually watched me as I turned and looked out the window and saw my jaw drop open. For some of them that was the first they knew that something horrible was happening, because they saw me looking with this incredible look of disbelief on my face. And of course it was only a few minutes later that we saw the second plane go in. So it was a very memorable moment for me and I'm sure one that I'll certainly never forget.

I think for the first minutes, probably for ten or fifteen minutes, I thought it was a small private plane and a tragic accident and continued to believe that until of course the second plane went in and when we saw that we knew that this was intentional and the impact finally began to hit. So first I thought it was an accident and then when I saw the second one I was convinced that it was a tragedy, a terrible, terrible tragedy. In fact I just couldn't believe it and I think a lot of people felt that same way. “Could this really be happening?”

(Did you have any friends or relatives that were directly affected by the attacks?)

Not really. We have a member of our Board of Trustees who later got quite involved in the help. He was Bill Francis of the Salvation Army and he was quite involved in the process of helping people. I had a couple of family friends who were living in NYC who immediately volunteered and went down to St. Vincent's, the hospital that was near to the site and these two young men I guess managed to get through the police barricades and volunteered and basically stayed there for two or three days, helping to hand out food to people and to help at the hospital. But, other than those, there really was no one that we were aware of personally that was involved actually in the tragedy.

(What was the role you felt you needed to take as GC President?)

Well, I guess I should start by saying that I never really feared for our community's safety, I guess because I reminded myself of where we are located. I began to of course feel concerned for how people would respond, but how we ourselves respond individually isn't always the way others respond. It's hard to put yourself in other people's shoes and imagine the depth to which it can affect them. But I felt my primary responsibility was just to be visible. I really didn't feel so much that it was important that I say anything. I mean, what can be said? What words can make any difference in the light of something like that? But I felt it was important to be visible, and so as you know we had a gathering in the church and then as you recall, I think it was the next day, we gathered on Scott Field. That I think was the time I will remember most; the gathering in a circle on Scott Field.

(How do you think as Christians we should be responding to the Islamic Community?)

Well, as you know, we've done a lot of things on campus to try and tackle that directly. The COR 410 class that we ran as a pilot class last year chose the topic of terrorism, and this year it's human sexuality. It's our desire, as probably all of you have heard me say more times than you'd like, is: To transform our students, equipping them for lives of character and service. And service has to do with really understanding how to tackle the real problems that the world faces. But if we don't ever have any practice with that, if we don't try to model it, then we're not really doing our jobs. Our feeling was that we needed to help students to understand that as Christians we have a particular responsibility to tackle real issues. So, when we talked about this for the whole course, we talked a lot about what it means to be people of faith, and to be passionate about our faith, and at the same time to be people who hold our own views with a certain humility of attitude. And I think that's a real challenge. It's tempting to either become so dogmatic that you want to go out and fight or kill anybody that disagrees with you, or on the other hand, you become so tolerant of other people's view that anything goes.

And it's precisely the ability to do both of those at once, to hold those two in tension or in paradox, as you often hear me say, that I think is often one of the cheap outcomes of our education. So, I think it's our responsibility as a college to help students understand, and this is a good illustration of it. Our calling is to be committed as Christians and as believers who accept that Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. But, at the same time, to recognize that the world has people in it who are equally passionate about their point of view and that we've somehow got to get out of the mode of trying always to argue people into our position, and leave that to the Holy Spirit to do. And to affirm them as people who are God's creations and for whom He died as much as He died for us. And being able to do that is very hard. It's just very hard and I'm proud to say that I think a good number of our students understand that that's the goal, just as faculty and staff understand it as a goal. Even if none of us is perfect, even if none of has fully arrived at trying to embrace that tension. So, yeah, I guess that's a long-winded answer, but I guess my hope is that as Christians we will learn to be passionate in our faith, but at the same time to hold our faith and our beliefs with open hands in a humility of spirit, that will really model for the rest of the world what it takes to get along.

(Did you know how the faculty was feeling?)

Yeah, I can't say I had long conversations with them. I think it was important for them to be visible and available because often students would go to them and talk because they have a closer relationship than they might have with me. I think that the sessions in Armington where we projected things on the side of the wall, CNN news there was a healthy thing because it allowed us a place to gather, and I think there were faculty present and I think that there were students there that illustrated that we were struggling with this too, and to be together in community in a time of crisis I think was a healthy way for faculty to respond, and many of them did. Now, if you're asking about specific thoughts that they may have had about how we were coping with this, it was interesting that after about a day or two, I heard a number of faculty mention that they were surprised, and I think I noticed this too, how quickly our students, how should I say, got past it. And I don't know that that's a bad thing. I mean often it's a healthy thing to be able to move on, but I did hear a number of faculty say that they were surprised that students thought of it as “old news” within three days even.

(What do you think about a curriculum change that could make students more updated on current events?)

I suppose that's a good possibility. Of course we did immediately respond with the senior course. I think that maybe the even bigger benefit is that an event like this causes students to take a different attitude towards the curriculum that already exists. Because, to be perfectly honest, I believe the liberal arts allows for wonderful preparation for helping students learn to understand and tackle the very nuance complexities of the world. And the problem is that unless and until students understand how all of this bears on those problems, then the education is not fully understood or appreciated. And so maybe more than an event like this prompting us to create new curricula, an event like this can cause students, and faculty alike, to take more seriously how the curricula that already exists is really relevant to the problems of the world. It brings it all home. We're all familiar with that phenomenon where we've got something that we're familiar with but don't really appreciate until something happens, and then, all of a sudden it speaks in new words to us. My daughter, who is in law school, was struggling with some issues last week, and she said, “You know Dad, I read the 23 rd Psalm, and it had new meaning to me. It just had completely new meaning.” And I think that's kind of the power of an event like this.

(Do you feel a Current Events class is a necessity?)

I can't imagine that a course in Current Events would be a problem, I certainly wouldn't oppose it, but again, I think as I've said, a course in Current Events is a little hard for me to imagine because a course in a context like ours is a course that doesn't just give students facts, but it gives them theory in which to understand and interpret those facts. I've always had the view that experience, in itself, is not an education. Experience without the context of an historical perspective and without the context of a theoretical perspective is not educational at all. So, if we were to have more of our courses in whatever discipline that emphasized theoretical and historical perspectives on the current events that are happening, I think that would be even better. Otherwise it just becomes, “Well, let's all sit down and watch CNN.” You sit down and watch CNN, big deal. Lots of us watch CNN by the hour, but do we learn from it? Do we benefit from it? I'm not sure, unless we engage in conversation and that's what I think would be particularly helpful, is if all of us, because of events like this, took seriously the need to take what we learn theoretically and historically in the classroom, in whatever discipline, and apply it to the real world. That's exactly what we want. That's why COR 101 is set up as a bookend course at the beginning of the experience to introduce students to a taste of real-world issues. Movies: and how do you discriminate? Gender roles; real issues that people are asking. Of course you don't have a lot of disciplinary skill as a freshman yet to bring the bear on that, but by coming back as a senior and then tackling a real issue again and say, “Hey, you know all of that stuff that I learned in Psychology, all that stuff I learned in Literature, all that stuff I learned in Chemistry? That really has a bearing on this issue. And that's the point: To help students to see that the disciplines, for their own sake, are valuable, but as they apply to real issues, I think take us a step beyond and teach us to really serve.

I think that being passionate about what we're doing is the key. If I had a choice between a classroom full of students who were brilliant in every way and could score perfectly on tests, but were relatively indifferent to the subject matter, or those who were passionately interested in the subject matter, even if less well-prepared and less capable, I'd take the second group any day. Because, really, the secret of getting a good education is not how bright you are or how many resources you have; it's not whether you go to a prestigious school or blah, blah, blah. The secret is your motivation and engagement. If you're motivated, if you're engaged in your education, then you're going to learn, regardless of where you are, and there's empirical evidence to support that.

(What are your thought on the resurgence of patriotism, post-September 11th ?)

I don't think anyone should feel more guilty for not feeling more deeply about it; I think that would be a mistake. I think emotions are just that way: They come and they're strong, and they go. And if there's a lesson to be learned in it, the lesson I suppose is that the sooner we realize that we can't be motivated to do the right thing merely by emotion the better. We've got to be motivated to do the right thing, because it's the right thing. We've got to do that in whatever commitment we make, whether it's a commitment to a spouse. You know, if I only loved Ellen Mannoia on the days when I had a lot of deep passion and emotion about it, well, you know, there would be a lot of days when I didn't love her. But, if I love her on the days when I keep my promise to her to be committed and faithful, well then, I love her all the time, likewise in our relationship with Christ. If we only loved Christ on the days when we've had a super quiet time, and been moved powerfully like the message you (Joy Wrigglesworth) gave at the senior 401 retreat, then there will be a lot of days when we don't love Christ. But, if we love Christ on the days that we remind ourselves that He is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and we've made a commitment to Him, then the strength of that commitment, and His help embraced through faith, will keep us consistent. So likewise, if we only do the right thing for our country, on the times when we feel this massive influx of patriotic feeling, well then we're going to be fickle. But if we do because we have, through an experience like that, come to appreciate the value of the country in which we live, then that's great, because we can remember that. So I guess what I would hope is not that every student would have on that occasion felt this profound emotion, but that whatever level of emotion that you felt would translate into a recognition, an understanding, about what it is you value in this country. On the basis of that understanding and those facts, that your life would be changed. And that from that day forward, you wouldn't be so quick to say, “Oh well, this country is nothing but rotten” or “Oh well, this country is full of all kinds of problems,” but that you would stop and say, “Well, you know, I remember enough about the emotion I had, even though I don't feel it now, to recall that I was proud of my country that day. And I was proud of what we did.” And so forth. I guess the point is that we shouldn't feel badly about the level of emotion that we had then or that we have now. But rather, what we decided to do about the experiences we had then.

(How do you feel about the political state of the US, two years after September 11th ?)

I think presently that we have an administration that values character, and that's important to me, that values faith, and that's important to me. But at the same time, I think it's important to realize that character and faith while I believe they're necessary conditions for good government, they're not sufficient. And so, neither of those convictions about the current government would stand in the way of my being willing to criticize aspects of what they're doing. I think that they were clear in their response, and decided to take steps in regard to centers of terrorism. I don't happen to agree with those who believe that our primary motivation for going into Iraq was for oil. Maybe I'm naive about that or maybe I'm unrealistic, but I don't think that was the primary motivation. On the other hand, I'm not sure that there was a completely realistic estimate as to how much time and how much effort it was going to take to completely bring that job to conclusion. It's easy to leap, and not to count the cost. And I think we're all beginning to ask that question now. But I certainly think it was appropriate that all of us stood behind the President and the troops over there and still stand behind them, because right or wrong, what they're doing is to defend their country. And, after all, we're the ones who are the beneficiaries of that.

I appreciate the fact that you guys are thoughtful enough to come up here for the day and to invest some time, and the listeners likewise, in think about how all this has made an impact on them. We'll all be changed because of it, and I hope and pray that it will be a change that causes us to appreciate more the place we live; to recognize the potential danger when people become so dogmatic about the things that they believe that they are prepared to sacrifice other's lives for it. And I think that we have to all of us be aware that the potential for that exists in our hearts as much as it exists in the hearts of Muslims. To whatever extent, this is a lesson to us about avoiding that kind of fanaticism, then I hope it is driven deep and it is learned well. Because certainly Muslims have no monopoly on dogmatism.