SGA President Reflects on 9/11

For the current generation of young people, Sept. 11, 2001 was the first time many young Americans had ever heard of such terms as al-Qaeda, Jihad, terrorism, Osama Bin Laden, or even the World Trade Center.The cataclysmic event on Sept. 11, 2001 wasn’t just an accident or a spontaneous decision. A lot of planning went into it.

“There were people who sat down and plotted it. They learned how to fly planes, they had spies giving them information, and they figured out where to hit us the hardest – our financial center and our defense center,” senior SGA President David Vazquez said. “It is presumed that another plane was headed for our nation’s capitol to either bomb the White House or the Capitol building. This was the first attack toward civilians, not just our military.”

Vazquez believes America united together under tragedy, and even to this day, is continuing to heal and move on.“The miracle is that ten years later, our country has not been attacked since that day, which clearly shows we have taken the right steps to keep this nation safe,” Vazquez said.

Although this country experienced humans at their worst, it also saw humans at their best.

“I think the greatest story of it all is how our nation responded. What stands out to me is the incredible act of heroism on that day. It’s simply amazing how the human spirit is to respond to situations like that and reach out to people suffering,” Vazquez said.

In December 2001, three months after the attacks, Vanguard sent a relief team to Ground Zero during winter break. There the students spent time praying for the firefighters and people on the street and got the chance to come face to face with what happened 2,800 miles away from Vanguard.

“I was so impacted, almost to the point of tears, when I saw the video of the VU student relief team. I was so proud of our school to see that’s how we responded, and that they saw the trip as not only their civic responsibility, but also as their responsibility as Christians,” Vazquez said.

The ten-year anniversary of Sept. 11 recently passed, causing the entire country to reflect back on the last decade’s events.

“Every year on Sept. 11,  I feel a sense of being proud of our nation. Over the years, I’ve really begun to understand what it means to be American. For a while after those events, it didn’t matter if you were a Republican or a Democrat – you were an American,” Vazquez said.