"Until September 11, 2001, we had no sample of any size to tell us what people were like when they faced certain death. Now, however, we know, thanks to dozens of cell phone calls and beyond any doubt, what men and women do in these last seconds of their lives.

"They forget themselves as they think of those they love, their spouses and children, their parents and friends. They do not complain or bemoan their fate. Neither do they pray for miraculous deliverance or even for the forgiveness of their sins. They do not think about themselves as they speak their last words.

"They just want to tell others how much they love them, that they want them to be safe, that they want them to be happy, that their last will and their true testament is one of utter concern for those they cherish, that they break free of the grasp of death and judgment on their lives by giving themselves away so completely that, before time runs out, they are already immersed in the eternal.

"The flaming towers and the skies were not filled with business travelers or tourists that last morning but with lovers, some laying down their lives for their friends, but all of them at their best, drawn fully out of themselves so that we see them as they really were all the time. Blessed are these Boomers, unpossessed by their possessions, saving us rather than themselves, loving their own until the end, as great or greater than any generation we will ever know."