[MajestyJo]

1 On this day in 1986 the United States’
Space Shuttle “Challenger” roared into
the sky from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
The world’s TV cameras were focused on
the rocket as it carried five men and two
women. One of the women, Christa
McAuliffe (a high school teacher), had
won a contest to be the first “ordinary
person” in space.
2 Millions of people watched live on television
as, suddenly, a minute after blastoff,
“Challenger” exploded
3 In a speech to the people of the United
States, President Ronald Reagan quoted
a few lines from a poem written by a 19-
year old British Second World War pilot,
John Magee, who was killed in an air-collision
in 1941 just three months after writing
the poem. John Magee captures something
of the spirit and adventure of flying,
and talks of having put out his hand and
touched the face of God. We’ll use his
poem to reflect and pray today:
4 Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies
on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed,
and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred
things
You have not dreamed of
- wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there
I’ve chased the shouting wind along,
and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights
with easy grace,
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.