KIDS’ PAGE

By Colleen McDonald

September 11 September 19, 2001

After sad and terrible things happened in the eastern United States last week, many people gathered in churches, temples, and other religious buildings. They wanted to be with other people. They wanted to be in a safe place where they could cry and share their thoughts and feelings. And they wanted to begin to figure out why such a bad thing can happen and how we can make our world a safer, more peaceful place.

Tuesday night (Sept. 11) people came to our church. Two days later, I attended an inter-faith service– a meeting for people of different religions. We came together because we know that all religions include people who do good things as well as bad things. We came together because we believe we need to learn from one another, and not be afraid of people who are different from us. And we came together because we want to help one another solve some of the problems in our world.

At the inter-faith meeting, I said that Unitarian Universalists believe that all religions have something valuable to teach us about what is true and right in life. I told them that (a Hindu teacher named) Gandhi had said, “It is possible to live in peace.” Then we said the following words together: (Your family might want to read them together also.)

Buddhism teaches, “Hurt not others with that which pains yourself.”