Cop turned pastor refl ects on 9/11 experiences
The Rev. Jeanine D. Owens of Abiding Presence Lutheran Church in the
Bronx refl ects on her time as a cop in New Yor k City on 9/11.
Photo courtesy Rev. Jeanine D. Owens
9/11 - 20 YEARS L 30 ATER, SEPT. 9-16, 2021 BTR
BY JASON COHEN
Before joining the clergy
in 2010, Rev. Jeanine Owens
spent more than two decades
as a cop. Of her 23 years on the
job, the one day she will never
forget was when the towers
fell on 9/11.
Owens, now in her 60s, was
a detective assigned to a building
on Hudson Street in Lower
Manhattan not far from the
World Trade Center. On Sept.
11, 2001, she was sitting at her
desk when she heard a loud
boom.
“It almost shook the building,
and someone walked
in and said that a plane had
crashed in the street,” she
told the Bronx Times. “I went
down the hall, went to the
back and everybody was looking
out the window.”
At fi rst, she fi gured it was
just an accident, but then she
saw the second plane strike
the towers shortly after and
knew it was real. It was the
most terrifying moment of her
life. As she sat watching the
horror of 9/11 unravel, Owens
witnessed people jumping
— to their deaths — out of the
buildings.
“Even talking about it
brings back memories,” Owens
said. “It’s hard to put into
words, but it was unbelievable
that we actually saw it happen.”
Immediately after the attack
she and her colleagues
were sent to Stuyvesant High
School in Manhattan to debrief
survivors. But they soon
came to the realization that
there were none.
She was then assigned to
a missing persons task force,
where she manned the phones
and spoke with family members
who were looking for
loved ones. Talking with them
was emotionally draining and
diffi cult, she said.
Owens, today a pastor at
Abiding Presence Lutheran
Church at 1672 E. 172nd St.,
would take down their information,
but often their son,
daughter, husband, wife or
mother was never found.
“There was nothing they
could really do,” she said.
“People were in shock.”
According to Owens, it
was pure and utter chaos. On
9/11 no one cared about race
or ethnicity, it was simply
people helping people recover
and survive. “People were
just walking around feeling
like we were under attack,”
she said. “A lot of us felt helpless
that we couldn’t do more.
It was a very diffi cult and trying
time.”
When she fi nally arrived at
Ground Zero, Owens saw a big
gaping hole in the street and
everything and everyone was
covered in ashes. Something
like that never gets erased
from your memory, she said.
And after the longest day of
her life, Owens fi nally made it
home to her family in Queens.
“After all that adrenaline
I couldn’t really sleep that
night,” she said. “My mind
was in overtime.”
For the next couple months,
she worked from 4 a.m.-4 p.m.
in Staten Island helping to
sift through transported debris
from the attack, fi nding
Metro Cards, identifi cations
and more.
Her life along with many
others changed after 9/11.
She eventually began
to feel a calling to God and
church. So, during the last
few years on the force she
enrolled in seminary and in
2007, retired.m However, she
told the Bronx Times that
she never envisioned herself
being anything other than a
cop.
“I never imagined I would
be a pastor and have my own
church,” she said. “That was
never on my radar.”
Owens, who lives in Long
Island, typically does not talk
about 9/11. While it’s something
she will never forget,
she said it’s quite painful to
speak about.
But her time with the
church has made it easier
for her to look back on those
times, she said. Now, 20 years
later, she knows this year
the anniversary will be emotional.
“Every September I try
to focus on how grateful I
am to be able to serve in the
church,” the pastor said.
“When I look back to when
it happened, it doesn’t seem
like it’s been that long.”