When the seats of the Wharton Center’s Great Hall filled Friday afternoon, students, faculty and community members who wanted to participate in the university-sponsored prayer and remembrance service moved to the Pasant Theatre’s simulcast.
When the Pasant Theatre filled, they crouched in the aisles and lined the staircases of the halls.
When those were filled, they listened quietly, shoulder-to-shoulder, in the lobby.
More than 3,800 people came to the service, leaving classrooms and offices across campus empty. Others watched the ceremony as it was broadcast on campus television. Some employees arrived with loosened ties and unbuttoned jackets while some students appeared still in pajamas. Most pinned ribbons of red, white and blue or yellow to their chests.
Although campus and classes remained open Tuesday when the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington were attacked, MSU President M. Peter McPherson opted to close campus for the reflection and memorial.
President Bush declared Friday “National Day of Prayer and Remembrance for the Victims Of the Terrorist Attacks on September 11, 2001.”
“I think that this campus has come together,” McPherson said. “May we each in our own way give our prayer and remembrance to our victims and their families.”
Leaders from five area religious groups - Baptist, Muslim, Buddhist, Roman Catholic and Jewish - joined administrators and student representatives for the unified service.
“We may look different, speak different and live in different places, but we are all members of the same human race,” said the Rev. Lester Stone from Lansing’s Friendship Baptist Church, 925 W. Main St. “Have us all to know that everything is going to be all right even in the midst of disaster.
“We may endure in the night but there is joy in the morning.”
Psychology senior Jameel Aftab, president of the Muslim Students’ Association, said he was pleased the service encompassed so many religious groups - and that so many people responded with their prayers.
“To see these thousands of people shows the strength of our community,” he said. “Our community is not ignorant. People here are understanding.”
Candles lighted by university representatives burned throughout the service. MSU’s Symphony Orchestra performed music throughout the service, which was planned in fewer than 20 hours.
When the service’s last prayers had been whispered and the last tears shed on the Wharton Center’s floor, McPherson asked for a moment of silence and a quiet exit.
“It had an emotional effect on everyone,” said parks, recreation and tourism sophomore Samantha Goodenough as she left the center. “It tore me apart when I heard about it. I didn’t know what to think. There’s a lot of feeling, a lot of heartache going on.”
