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God blessed us with a close-knit family where each one of our children is equally loved within the family group, but also loved for their individual personality and uniqueness. Michael was our seventh child and fifth son. He was fun loving, generous, a gentle person and the peacemaker when heated discussions took place. He had the ability to make everyone laugh with a comic expression or an appropriate one-liner that made us realize we shouldn’t take life too seriously. We also have a loving extended family and we feel great sorrow and mourn deeply when any one of the loved ones within our extended family passes on. Our immediate family has been fortunate in that we have had many years of happiness together and experienced no great sorrow until -September 11th. Yes - our hearts were grievously wounded- as were those of many other families and Americans. We take solace in the knowledge that, on that tragic day, our son Michael and his heroic fellow firefighters, rushed to what is now known as Ground Zero. Despite seeing indescribable horror and devastation, these rescuers unflinchingly and courageously, entered Tower 2 and began fighting fires and evacuating civilians. We do not know what acts of courage Michael and his brothers performed that day, but we do know that thousands of civilian lives were saved because they went in and up while others were coming down and getting out. Michael and 342 of his fellow rescuers made the supreme sacrifice that day - laying down their lives so that their fellow citizens might live. In the first weeks of the rescue effort we lived on the hope that somehow Michael and those with him would somehow survive, but as time passed our hope diminished. We now pray for the recovery of the bodies of Michael and his companions and will diligently guard every effort to preserve the dignity of these heroes. Michael and the rescuers who lost their lives on September 11th are heroes and rightly so because of the sacrifice they made. Sitting in the pews here today we are in the presence of living heroes, each of them knowing that they too may be called to put themselves in harm’s way at a moments notice. These are the members of the New York City fire Department. It is almost inconceivable to think that we will never see Michael’s smiling face again in this life but we have faith that, as Jesus said, "Greater love than this , no man hath, than he lay down his life for his friend" Michael is abiding with the Communion of Saints in Heaven and if we live our lives as Jesus taught we will see him again on the other side of the circle of life. Kathleen and Jack Lynch |