CHICAGO (ELCA) -- At least three members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) were on board American Airlines Flight 587 (Airbus A300) when it crashed Nov. 12 in the Rockaways neighborhood of Queens, N.Y., shortly after takeoff from the John F. Kennedy International Airport. All 260 people aboard the plane and several more on the ground died. The plane was en route to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
A woman and her nine-year-old son, members of Transfiguration Lutheran Church, Bronx, N.Y., were traveling to the Dominican Republic to visit with family, and a man, who was a member of La Iglesia Luterana de Cristo, Freeport, N.Y., planned to conduct business and visit with family there, said the Rev. Gary E. Mills, assistant to the bishop, ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod.
Mills said American Airlines Flight 587 serves as a "daily shuttle" for New York residents originally from the Dominican Republic. For some, it is "like taking the subway to work," he said.
Members of St. Barnabas Lutheran Church, Howard Beach (Queens), N.Y., are "safe," said the Rev. Stephen P. Bouman, bishop of the ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod. St. Barnabas is about five miles north of the Belle Harbor section of the Rockaways.
"It is remarkable that a plane of that size can hit a densely populated residential community and not burn down the whole neighborhood," the Rev. William E. Baum, pastor of St. Barnabas, wrote in a Nov. 13 letter to Bouman.
"By the end of the day yesterday, we had accounted for just about everybody in our circle of contacts," Baum said of his congregation.
"We have heard what have come to be the familiar New York City disaster stories: the near misses, the I-would-have-been-on-that-block- except-it-was-a-holiday stories, and the I-used-to-live-around-the- corner reports," he said.
For the past 10 years, Baum has been serving as pastor for St. Barnabas. "Our ministry together started off with the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993, then came September 11 and now this. How familiar the routine has become. Trying to call around to members, family, friends in the concentric circles through communication lines that get jammed-up or knocked down and don't work. Just when you think everybody's accounted for, you realize that each family has a whole network of aunts and uncles, cousins, childhood friends, co-workers and acquaintances, and it takes an agonizingly long time to track everybody down," he said.
"We're grateful to live in a city of such resilience, heroism and Job-like stubborn faith," Baum said.
According to Bouman, the Rockaways were "hit hard" on Sept. 11, when terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in New York and damaged the Pentagon near Washington, D.C. "About 25 firefighters and 75 others [from the Rockaways] died" as a result of the Sept. 11 tragedy, he said.
For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://listserv.elca.org/archives/elcanews.html
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About the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America:
The ELCA is one of the largest Christian denominations in the United States, with 2.8 million members in more than 8,500 worshiping communities across the 50 states and in the Caribbean region. Known as the church of "God's work. Our hands.," the ELCA emphasizes the saving grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ, unity among Christians and service in the world. The ELCA's roots are in the writings of the German church reformer Martin Luther.
For information contact:
Candice Hill Buchbinder
Public Relations Manager
Candice.HillBuchbinder@ELCA.org
