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PRAYERS McAuliffe recalled as nation reflects
By Michele Kurtz, Globe Staff, 2/3/2003
Each Mass at St. Bridget's Church in Framingham yesterday concluded with ''America the Beautiful,'' in tribute to the space travelers who on Saturday followed the fate of Christa McAuliffe, a Framingham native who died when the space shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after liftoff in 1986. McAuliffe had attended Marian High School, a Catholic school in St. Bridget Parish, and had gone on to Framingham State College, noted the Monsignor Francis V. Strahan, pastor of the parish. ''We're just as stunned about this as we were 17 years ago,'' Strahan said in a telephone interview. ''It certainly has struck home how fragile the human condition is. . . . We never know the hour of the day when the Lord is going to call us.''
At Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston, congregants offered a brief prayer for the seven astronauts. After Mass, Bishop Richard G. Lennon told reporters he was at Logan International Airport on Saturday when he heard the news. ''The first thing we did was we all said a prayer,'' Lennon said. Asked how the families of the astronauts might find comfort, Lennon said, ''God loves their loved ones who died, and he loves them. ''God's love is bigger than the tragedy,'' Lennon said. Just hours after the explosion Saturday, about 50 Indian-Americans who gathered in Shrewsbury for a monthly prayer recitation organized a special peace prayer for the seven astronauts. Like many Indian-Americans, they had been watching the Columbia mission with special interest and pride because Kalpana Chawla, an Indian-American who grew up in India, was on board, said Chandrakant Panse, president of the New England region of the Friends of India Society International. ''We looked at her career and how brilliant she was,'' Panse, of Newton Highlands, said yesterday. ''We are praying for the peace for the souls of our departed heroes, and we are praying for the families. We will take a great deal of pride in what these courageous people achieved.'' Accompanied by Laura Bush, the president attended the 8 a.m. worship service yesterday at St. John's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C. He did not make any public remarks.Some ministers who had planned to address the prospect of war with Iraq, the economy, and other topics dominating public discussion instead spoke of the sacrifice the seven astronauts made to further science. ''There have always been those people who had the courage and the faith to move through frontiers. They do that at great risk sometimes, and we are the beneficiaries of their great spirit and bravery,'' said the Rev. Victor Nixon, of Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church in Little Rock, Ark. A 9-year-old girl stood on tiptoes to light seven memorial candles on the altar of the First United Methodist Church of Titusville, Fla., where many Kennedy Space Center workers live. The pastor, the Rev. David Waller, called the trail of smoke from the shattered spacecraft a ''glistening tear across the face of the heavens.'' Members of Temple Israel of Greater Miami recited the Kaddish, or traditional prayer for the dead, for Israeli astronaut Ilan Roman and the six other crew members. The tragedy happened on the Sabbath, when Jews are prohibited from mourning, so many congregations held special services yesterday. Material from the Associated Press was included in this report.
This story ran on page A6 of the Boston Globe on 2/3/2003.
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n special prayers and silent reflection, congregants throughout New England and across the country yesterday honored the memories of seven astronauts killed aboard the space shuttle Columbia and offered sympathy to their grieving families.
