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Community Corner

Dearborn Commemorates 9/11 with Interfaith Vigil

Religious, cultural and political leaders—including Gov. Rick Snyder—met outside Henry Ford Museum Sunday evening to honor lives lost and to pray for a peaceful future.

Dearborn residents, city and state officials, and religious leaders of all faiths gathered in front of The Henry Ford Museum Sunday evening to pay tribute to lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001, as well as to reflect on their hopes for the future.

The 10th anniversary ceremony was mirrored after an event held exactly one decade ago by the city just after the 9/11 attacks.

Among other dignitaries, Sunday's event was attended by Gov. Rick Snyder, Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), Rep. George Darany (D-Dearborn), as well as multiple Dearborn city and Dearborn Public Schools officials.

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"When you look at 9/11, we need to remember all those people who gave their lives, all the survivors and their families," said Gov. Snyder. "But there’s another lesson to be learned from 9/11: to reinforce the need for unity. When you look at what happened out of that tragic time, we came together as a country. We united."

The same was true for Dearborn, added Mayor Jack O'Reilly, who praised the response 10 years ago—as well as the efforts on the 10th anniversary—to make Sept. 11 about unity and support, not fear and hatred.

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"We need to value our diversity,” he said. “To be a community where everyone chooses to come to … and finds support and resources to achieve their goals. A place of peace and understanding that can be a beacon to the world.”

And as the Dearborn community gathered, just as they had 10 years ago, Henry Ford President Patricia Mooradian asked that attendees not just remember events gone by, but think of what the world can become.

“We gather again as one community committed to remembrance of our shared history, but equally committed to forging a shared just and peaceful future," she said. "So let our mood tonight be just that right mix of solemnity and optimism; of sadness, but also of hope; of the past, with an eye toward the future.”

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