By Nathan Brockman
While residents and workers in lower Manhattan go about their daily routine, out-of-town visitors gather in packs along Church Street, craning their necks to imagine where the towers were. Tour operators snake larger groups through the crowds while vendors sell 9-11 trinkets.
If the pattern holds, four million people will visit Ground Zero over the next year. Nearly a third will enter St. Paul's Chapel, challenging clergy with a flock defined by daily turnover.
To minister to their needs, a new service featuring interdenominational prayers has been added to weekly services.
The chapel, which adjoins the northeast corner of the World Trade Center site, was built in 1776 and is one of the nation's oldest Episcopal chapels. It is part of the Parish of Trinity Church.
Explaining the parish's motives for the new service, the vicar, the Rev. Samuel Johnson Howard, said "there was a sense that we had to be more open and inclusive" in approaching visitors to St. Paul's.
At a time when a 30 foot square banner welcomed people to an exhibition -- drawing 300,000 viewers into St. Paul's in three months -- the chapel was offering an Episcopalian Holy Eucharist on weekdays at noon. Few attended.
Yet a survey of chapel visitors indicated that most wanted to sanctify their ground-zero visit with a religious experience.
The new service, joined by upwards of 75 people a day, reflects the fact that, in Fr. Howard's words, "not everyone is denominationally oriented, not everyone goes to church."
Fr. Howard rebuts suggestions that St. Paul's should have a tighter denominational focus: "We remain who we are. The essence of what we are comes through."
The results of the survey are a treasure trove. Fr. Howard, who lives in nearby Battery Park City, was surprised to learn that "80 percent of visitors to St. Paul's would come back, that they would bring a friend, and that the most likely reason to come back would be a religious service."
Beyond that, he says, "we now know a lot more about who is visiting Ground Zero." For instance, 75 percent of visitors are women, and visitors are most prominently Protestant, Roman Catholic, Jewish, or of no religion.
While 36 percent of visitors are from the Northeast, nearly equal proportions hail from the Midwest, West, and South of the country, and from outside the country. Most are white and nine in 10 neither live nor work in lower Manhattan.
"We want to help people make their visits here sacred. If we can help do that, we're doing our job," says Howard.
The interdenominational services take place at St. Paul"s Monday through Saturday at noon.
Posted on Trinity News December 18, 2002
