New York City's new fire chief finds strength in congregation
Firefighter Daniel Nigro has walked through the doors of many houses of worship since Sept. 11. He wasn't there for religious fulfillment but to mourn and say farewell to three dozen colleagues confirmed dead at the World Trade Center. More than 300 others are unaccounted for at presstime.
A 32-year veteran of the New York City Fire Department, Nigro was promoted to chief-the top-ranking uniformed official-Sept. 16 after his close friend and the former chief, Peter Ganci, was killed in the collapse of the second tower.
Nigro also has sat in the pews of his congregation, Good Shepherd Lutheran, Bayside, Queens, every Sunday since the tragedy.
"It was very important for us to get there," he says of himself and nine other firefighters and emergency medical workers who are members or regularly attend this congregation of 96. Nigro says it was important for spiritual reasons but also to comfort other parishioners.
The congregation found out by the end of that tragic Tuesday the status of its active firefighters. Jane Gaeta, pastor, called their homes, and with the help of EMT Patricia Parra, who spent the day at her office in FDNY headquarters in Brooklyn, the two determined that every person had survived. (Six firefighters from other ELCA congregations were killed. See page 24.)
Nigro told The Lutheran that many
firefighters have faith interpretations of why they were spared. "My particular faith doesn't extend there. I kind of think that [it] was random," he says.
But faith has helped Nigro cope with the loss of so many friends and colleagues, with his new responsibilities and the endless job of staying late at the site daily to give pep talks to the firefighters.
"I don't know what it would be like not to have that. Even while it was going on, I didn't feel this horrendous dread. I'd like to think that was because of my faith," says Nigro, who arrived at the scene when the buildings were standing.
Nigro's father, Daniel A. Nigro II, is a retired captain (and 50-year member of Good Shepherd), as are his older daughter's boyfriend and his three nephews.
Larry Sorensen, a full-time firefighter and the church's part-time organist, is also the son of a firefighter. Sorensen, Nigro and Parra all attended the same high school and were taught by the same Sunday school teacher.
But Good Shepherd's firefighters share other things: a sense of commitment to community and church (many are assisting ministers, committee and council members, and five sing periodically in the "Fire Choir") and the desire to help people and preserve life.
Now they also share their survival of this tragedy and the loss of friends and firefighters.
God is like a woman searching for a lost coin, a shepherd searching for the lost sheep. Surely God shares our heartache and grief and anger and despair. Surely God does not willingly afflict evil on anyone. Surely God rejoices over every life saved, every hope rekindled, every sign of compassion and care.Could we even say that God is searching through the rubble right now, weeping over the loss of life?
Sermon excerpt
Craig M. Mueller
Holy Trinity, Chicago
Ernst, deputy copy chief of In Style, is a member of St. Luke Lutheran Church, Manhattan.
Copyright Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Nov 2001
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