TERRORIST ATTACKS Faith is foundation for rebuilding, Youngstown State professor says

Even nonbelievers turn to religious answers in times of trouble.
By D.A. WILKINSON
VINDICATOR RELIGION EDITOR
YOUNGSTOWN -- When disaster strikes, people of faith -- or none at all -- must deal with pain, fear and loss.
Dr. Victor F. Wan-Tatah, an associate professor in Youngstown State University's department of philosophy and religious studies, has addressed how religions help people go on and rebuild their lives.
"What 9/11 did, for us as individuals, as members of a community, or a nation, or as a world power, was to [make us] do some serious soul searching at a very deep and profound way on ... things that matter," he said.
This is what people of different faiths do regularly when they go to their church, temple or mosque, the educator said.
Dealing with death: The terrorist attacks on the United States made people realize the short span of life.
"You can have it now, and it can be gone tomorrow," Wan-Tatah said. "We have to be able to make the best use of our time."
That sensibility goes beyond the normal religious framework or mind-set to engage everything in life at different religious levels.
"How many memorials have we had, where our leaders -- our politicians, businessmen and women and people of different walks of life -- have participated? We are really talking about a resurgence or awareness of our 'national' religion," Wan-Tatah said.
There is, of course, no official, national religion in the United States. But there are common values held by Americans and their different faiths that effectively serve as a national religion.
People may also find solace in their particular faith's beliefs or "tap into the religious or spiritual essence of all humans," Wan-Tatah said. "At times of crisis, there's no other institution, no other department of life, no other creation within human society that deals with the horrendous ... facts."
Wan-Tatah has been collecting and studying stories about the victims of 9/11 and their families. Religion, he noted, also provides both the framework and vocabulary for dealing with such tragedies.
Surviving family: A child who lost her father in the 9/11 attacks will ask, "Where is Daddy? Where has he gone?"
Wan-Tatah said the surviving family members, even if they are not religious, have to come up with an answer that comforts or satisfies the child's inquiring mind.
"There is some place where Daddy has gone ... where you eventually may see him or meet him again," Wan-Tatah said. "These stories and these structures and these forms and ways of thinking and explaining and accounting for our lives or for tragedies that visit us, that all religions share, make sense."
Even people who don't want to identify themselves with organized religions can't avoid such stories that have been passed down through time, he noted.
"Religious institutions were built on these stories [that] had something to do with the lives of the founders that served a social, cultural, political or spiritual need of those who had to deal with those tragedies," Wan-Tatah said.
Today, Western society is one of great affluence; the events of 9/11 remind us that we are our brother's keeper and should be aware of the plight of those who don't share that affluence, the educator said.
"Our lives are intertwined with all the lives of other people as well," Wan-Tatah said.
All of the major religions have one thing in common: They teach that their believers should share with those in need.
And most religions, said Wan-Tatah, believe in treating their neighbors with love and fairness.
That is how many faiths see life as it once was -- or should be, Wan-Tatah said.