Two decades later, Metuchen diaconate director recalls worst, best of humanity on 9/11

PISCATAWAY, N.J. – Sixty-two floors up in the southeast corner of One World Trade Center, where the North Tower once stood in Lower Manhattan, now-Deacon Stephen Kern locked eyes with his administrative assistant, who was kneeling under her desk paralyzed in fear as the building shook around them.

It’s an image, he says, that is forever etched into his mind following the harrowing terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.

Then an attorney for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, he had already ushered the eight other people under his supervision to the stairwell and later followed with his administrative assistant in tow. There, they were joined by an outpouring of people from the floors above them, also making their way slowly down the stairs, merging into the narrow stairway with those from the floors below them.

As they advanced down the stairs, they learned from someone with a pager that a plane had crashed into the North Tower, the building presently encasing them, the one they were working to descend. Without hearing the chaos of the world outside, only the noise of clattering footsteps and the chatter among fellow companions, they did not yet know that a second plane had hit the South Tower at 9:03 a.m., something they would only learn 10 to 15 minutes after the fact, when a second pager message arrived.

In that moment, the mood in the stairwell turned from curious to somber, as the magnitude of what was happening set in.

Deacon Kern, a husband and father of three school-age children at the time, made it safely to the ground floor, though he quickly decided to go down one more floor to the Port Authority Police Headquarters. At 9:59 a.m., only 10 minutes after his arrival to the police headquarters, he and those around him heard a huge roar. Unbeknownst to them, it was the sound of the South Tower collapsing.

“This time when the shaking and the noise stopped, and I realized I was alive, I had to start thinking about making my second escape of the morning,” said Deacon Kern. Battling the fog of dust and the mountains of debris, he made his way again, this time up, to the ground floor and then finally to the street.

He walked two blocks before he could see the sky through the haze. “When I could see it, I turned around to look at the towers, and I saw my tower, the North Tower, still standing with a huge multi-story hole in it, hot flames and smoke pouring out of it. And then I looked to my left, where I should have seen the South Tower, but there wasn't anything there. So, for the first time I realized what must have happened while I was down at the police headquarters.”

Determined to find a phone to call his wife, Rosemary, he walked about six blocks northwest of the World Trade Center.

“At 10:28 a.m., I heard that horrible roar for the second, and hopefully last, time in my life. This time, even though there were buildings between me and the site, this time I knew what that meant. This meant that my tower, the North Tower, was coming down,” another image that was burned into his memory that day, he said.

Almost three hours after the first plane hit the North Tower, and after watching the building he had worked in for nearly 20 years – a place he referred to as his “home away from home” – come crumbling to the ground, he was finally able to connect with his wife. “It was a very, very poignant phone call,” he said, holding back tears at the thought of it. “I just remember feeling so blessed that I could hear her voice again.”

As it was for many others, the rest of his day was spent trying to get out of Manhattan, which by then was gridlocked in all directions with sparse mass transit service. After boarding the first train he could and reuniting with his wife in New Jersey, and even before seeing his own children, he turned to the Lord in prayer. Covered in dust and seated near his wife in the back of St. Magdalen de Pazzi Church, Flemington, N.J., he attended Mass.

“That day, I said a lot of prayers of thanks,” said Deacon Kern. “As much as I wanted to see my kids when I got off the train, I just thought it was appropriate that we go and give thanks and pray for those who hadn't made it and for all those who, at that point, you didn't know if they’d made it or not, which was the status of things for quite a while,” he said of his decision to attend Mass immediately upon his arrival home that evening.

Earlier that morning and in His providence, the pastor and associate pastor of St. Magdalen de Pazzi Parish, located 63 miles west of the World Trade Center in New Jersey’s Hunterdon County, heard of the attacks and knew they had to tend to those in their pastoral care.

Fr. John Barbella, then-pastor of the parish and now pastor of St. Philip and St. James Parish in Phillipsburg, N.J., and Fr. Timothy Christy, then-associate pastor of the parish and now vicar general for the Diocese of Metuchen and rector of the Cathedral of St. Francis of Assisi in Metuchen, N.J., made the decision to expose the Blessed Sacrament in the church that afternoon.

“People started, almost immediately, coming to the church after news broke of the first tower being hit,” said Fr. Christy. “We then decided we should have a Mass in the evening for anyone who could make it.”

Word spread quickly that a Mass would be held that evening. In the church that night, and for all the Masses that followed in the next weeks, there was only enough room to stand, Fr. Christy recalled. “I think in times of crisis, people of faith immediately take refuge in getting as close to the Church as possible. The church building becomes very important as Catholics instinctively know Christ is present and that it is a safe and sacred place, even for those far away from regular practice,” he said.

Their parish community lost three people that day, with Deacon Kern being one of the lucky ones to make it out alive. “He became a witness to God's love and sought to view the whole event in terms of faith,” said Fr. Christy. “God did not cause this – it was the evil of human beings – God was working to help and heal all who were affected, those who lost their lives, those wounded and those who lost their loved ones.”

Now, twenty years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, as a speaker for school and corporate groups at the 9/11 Tribute Museum and as a docent for tours of the National 9/11 Memorial, Deacon Kern said that very question still haunts him, “how could this happen?”

“My response to kids is very, very hard. That's one of the hardest questions I'm ever asked,” said Deacon Kern. “When you have a 10-year-old girl look in your eyes and say, ‘why would a man fly a plane into a building, why would a person kill somebody else?’ You just find yourself stammering, at least I do. That's not easy.”

Having been ordained to the permanent diaconate in the Diocese of Metuchen in June 2010 and having served as the diocesan director of the Office of the Diaconate since his retirement from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in 2016, he said has less trouble answering the question of how God made this happen.

“I don't blame God for this at all. I really feel He didn't make it happen. He let it happen because He lets everything that we do happen. He gave us free will, which He must consider a fantastic gift, because He lets us mess up so many times and yet doesn’t interfere.”

The story he tells to students, groups and tourists – the story of his experiences that day – is one he has told hundreds of times and to thousands of people. It is one he has shared with millions of viewers, who have watched him recount his experiences in an HBO documentary and a new Netflix docuseries. But it is one he vows to continue telling in tribute to his 84 colleagues and the many others lost that day.

“We didn't see a lot of love that day; we saw the worst of humanity. But, in those days, weeks and months that followed, we also saw the best of humanity and how our love can mirror Jesus's love, and so that's the hope for all of us,” said Deacon Kern. “The nine months after 9/11, you kind of wish you could bottle that, the compassion everybody showed each other and that willingness to serve people you have never met and families you didn't know. It certainly crystallized my decision to enter into the diaconate formation.”

“From my standpoint, I'm still here. I've had a lot of people tell me that God had other plans for me, and so I consider myself blessed. I'm not going to forget it – I can't,” he said. “Forgiveness and service have been very prominent in my prayers to God about 9/11 and its aftermath. I think doing something good out of that experience is worthwhile and, frankly, it's kind of a part of my ministry as a deacon.”

# # #

Deacon Stephen Kern was ordained a permanent deacon for service in the Diocese of Metuchen in June 2010 and he now serves as the diocesan director of the Office of the Diaconate. A full account of his experience in the North Tower on September 11, 2001, can be heard on the Diocese of Metuchen’s podcast, “Am I Not Here.” Listen to the full episode here: www.lightingheartsonfire.org/aminothere. To learn more about the Diocese of Metuchen Office of the Diaconate, visit: www.diometuchen.org/diaconate