The sheer brutality and senselessness of the Oklahoma City bombing left an indelible impression on America. The Rev. Peter J. Van Hook, a Utahn who has tried to help the city recover, is certain of that.
The April 19 explosion in front of the Murrah Federal Building, which killed 168 innocent people and injured 500 others, stirred emotions deep inside nearly all of us."We're getting reports, for example, of Vietnam vets who are going through post-traumatic stress in reaction to it. Women who have been physically abused are reacting to it," said the Rev. Van Hook, 48, a priest with the Episcopal Diocese of Utah. "And that's happened all over the country, not just in Oklahoma."
What the Rev. Van Hook is not so sure about, however, is whether the bombing's impact will result in any real changes in each of us, and in society as a whole, to prevent such a tragedy from happening again.
In conversations with all he's met since returning from his eight-day stint in Oklahoma City, and in sermons to the West Valley congregation he is now serving, that larger issue has been paramount.
"This country tends to take a very long time to absorb its lessons," said the Rev. Van Hook, who was part of a disaster response unit sent to Oklahoma City by Church World Service, an organization consisting of 42 denominations including the Episcopalian and LDS churches.
"I hope not, but I'm not confident that we're going to realize the implications of this very soon. I think we're in a time of real turmoil."
What could prevent Americans from responding to the disaster appropriately, the Rev. Van Hook fears, is what he calls a "tradition of tolerance" - a belief system, stemming from Constitutional rights, that prompts citizens to ignore individuals and groups they don't agree with. That approach, when applied to extremists, extends perilously close, the Rev. Van Hook believes, to encouraging large-scale acts of violence.
"However you articulate it - right or tolerance or whatever - I do think we have our limits, and I do think we've reached that limit," he said. "I find the inflammatory rhetoric of these far-right groups (similar to) yelling fire in a crowd. They are entirely irresponsible when they say they have utterly no responsibility for what happened in Oklahoma City . . . I don't know how they sleep at night.
"I think we, number one, just need to stand up against extremism. I agree with the president entirely on that and with what he said in Montana, that you raise your fist in the air and say, `I will not accept this.' I think that's critically important and we've been far too reluctant to do that."
Equally disturbing to the Rev. Van Hook was one particular incidence of racially motivated violence that occurred in nearby Edmond, Okla., following the bombing. After hearing news reports that the incident had all the earmarks of a Middle Eastern terrorist plot, a group of teenagers attacked a pregnant Arab woman as she left a grocery store. She was badly injured and lost her unborn child, the Rev. Van Hook said.
"They blamed her and all the Arabs in the world for the bombing, and of course it ended up being one of us," he said. "It points out the racism that is latent in our society, and our willingness to blame somebody when something awful happens.
"I really think a big part of the responsibility for this rests with all of us, and that's very difficult for people to conceive."
All was not doom and gloom in Oklahoma. The Rev. Van Hook also came away from his experience as a disaster relief consultant with a renewed faith in humankind.
While staying clear of the immediate rescue and relief efforts, the Rev. Van Hook had the task of coordinating the long-term rehabilitative effort that will continue in Oklahoma City for several years. In doing so, he experienced a great outpouring of support from the entire community.
"There was a much higher level of cooperation and openness to one another in Oklahoma City than I've experienced before, and other people noted a real willingness to work together," he said. "It's a city that is divided in many ways, religiously as well as racially, like Salt Lake is, yet there was incredible openness and I was very gratified by that."
"In that regard, I met a lot of people that I'd love to work with again."
The Rev. Van Hook just hopes next time, if there is a next time, he will not be responding to a disaster America could have prevented.