Vigils Mark National Day of Prayer and Remembrance in City

By Teresa Rochester

Sept. 14 -- There were tears and hugs and moments of silence and song on Friday as Santa Monicans around the city joined with the rest of the country and each other for the National Day of Prayer and Remembrance.

From early morning until well past sunset scores of Santa Monicans -- from school children to retail employees and City officials -- took a break from what they were doing to pray for and remember those who died in Tuesday's attacks and to bolster shaken spirits.

At 8:45 a.m. Roosevelt Elementary School students, teachers, parents and community members joined hands to build a human ring around the school's perimeter in a demonstration of peace.

Participants sang "Let there be Peace on Earth and Let It Begin with Me," recited the Pledge of Allegiance and bowed their heads in a moment of silence.

At 11:00 a.m. a packed audience - some dressed in somber black and others in red, white and blue ensembles -- celebrated a memorial mass at Saint Anne's Church on Colorado Avenue. More than 100 adults, many of whom came from neighboring Sony Records, Columbia Records and Universal, shared pews with 250 parish school children.

Church ushers brought in blue folding chairs to accommodate the overflow crowd in the 800-seat church. Tears streamed down the faces of many celebrants and one man, overcome by sorrow, rested his face in his hands, as the church's pastor Fr. Mike Gutierrez spoke of challenges, the gift of life and the power of love.

"They [images of Tuesday's events] are challenges and reminders of another era of our country's innocence being challenged," Gutierrez said. "I stand here today as a proud American. I stand here today as the son of a World War II veteran. If I learned one thing from my father it's you keep standing.

"It will make sense some day and when it does you will not be alone," Gutierrez told the children present.

Brentwood resident and businesswoman Laurie McCormick came to the mass with colleague Vera Aynilian. McCormick said she does not usually attend church but after seeing an announcement for the mass on a local news broadcast she decided to go.

"I heard about it and I had to go," McCormick said before the service. "My family lives in Boston and New York. This is devastating. One is too many not to mention 5,000 [likely deaths]."

At noon Big Blue Bus drivers pulled their busses over at the closest bus stop to observe a minute of silence.

In front of City Hall 100 City employees made a circle around the flagpole and rose garden to observe a few moments of silence before singing a spontaneous rendition of the "Star Spangled Banner."

The usually bustling Third Street Promenade was nearly empty around noon. Street performer liaison Steele Smith said more performers turn out on rainy days than in the last two days. Four of the popular streets biggest retailers - The Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic and J. Crew - shut their doors during the noon hour in remembrance of Tuesday's victims.

At 12:30 pm Mayor Michael Feinstein, Mayor Pro Tem Richard Bloom and School Superintendent John Deasy joined approximately 250 students in the Santa Monica High School theater for an optional memorial service. The student body president told the crowd that their generation was not Generation X or Y but Generation WTC, referring to the World Trade Center towers demolished in Tuesday's attacks.

At 7 pm as the sun was setting, families throughout the city heeded an email that whipped around the nation on Wednesday and Thursday and stepped outside of their homes and lit candles as part of a nationwide show of unity.

"We will show the world that Americans are strong and united together against terrorism," read the email. "We need to reach everyone across the United States quickly. The message: WE STAND UNITED - WE WILL NOT TOLERATE TERRORISM."

At 7:30 pm the play field at Grant Elementary School in Sunset Park was filled with an ever growing crowd of more than 500 residents for a candlelight vigil to honor Dora Menchaca, who died when the plane she was traveling in slammed into the Pentagon Tuesday morning. Her 4-year-old son Jaryd Dorsey is a kindergartener at the school.

School principal Alan Friedenberg told the crowd that on a parent volunteer day shortly before school began Menchaca spent four hours weeding and sprucing up the school's garden. Menchaca was an avid gardener whose own garden was filled with colorful flowers and fruit trees.

"He's going to be alright," said Friedenberg said of Jaryd. "Because his mom was a wonderful person."

Friedenberg told the crowd that continued to swell that Earl Dorsey, Menchaca's husband of 19 years, was grateful for the outpouring of help from Grant families.

"He's very grateful. He just needs some time to sort this out," Friedenberg said. "His soul mate of 19 years is gone."

Father Gutierrez presented Friedenberg with a spiritual bouquet made of red, white and blue construction paper hearts by Saint Anne's school children for the Dorsey family, before offering words of comfort in English and Spanish to the assembled crowd.

A sea of candles flickered across the school field and words of reassurance by Grant parent Tuvya Zaretsky and Pastor Brad Bailey of the Vineyard Christian Fellowship Westside were punctuated by murmurs of the hundreds of children who attended the vigil with their parents.

"To truly remember," Bailey told them. "It means more than memory. It means meaning."