Dcn. Steve Morello was uniquely positioned to serve the Lord and the American people in the aftermath of the tragedies of September 11th, 2001.

(0:23) Dcn. Steve Morello pondered and prayed about why God had brought him to his job, until one day, six weeks into his tenure as General Counsel for the United States Army, when the answer became very clear.

(1:30) We learn about Dcn. Steve’s background in law and what brought him to his position as the army’s General Counsel.

(4:06) We discover more about what the Chief Legal Officer for the Department of the Army does, and what working in the Pentagon overseeing nearly 5,000 lawyers was like.

(5:50) Dcn. Steve talks about flying to Virginia Beach on September 10th, 2001 for an onboarding seminar — and about his discovery there of the attack on the Pentagon on September 11th.

(7:26) We discover the state of the Pentagon and the landscape to which Dcn. Steve returned on September 12th. He shares about his responsibilities in recovering from the event, both as General Counsel and as a deacon.

(11:44) Dcn. Steve shares his experience celebrating Mass on the side of the Pentagon in the aftermath of the attack, and the profound encounter with the Lord he’d had through the eyes and experiences of the relief workers in attendance.

(13:48) Dcn. Steve reaffirms the life-changing impact that Mass made on his ministry today throughout our archdiocese.

Reporting by Dan Meloy; narration by Casey McCorry; production by Ron Pangborn

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Title: Serving God and Country

Dcn. Steve: As I walked those halls and, you know, receive that unquestionable respect and all that other kinds of thing that goes with the office. I would ask myself constantly, or I would actually pray, Lord, why do you have a deacon in the belly of the beast? Why is the deacon here? Why do you want me here? What is my role? What am I to do here?

Narrator: Steve, the General Counsel of the Army, was also Deacon Steve, and had been for ten years. For the first six weeks on the job he was struggling to make sense of his two very distinct positions of leadership: one, a man of the cloth, and the other a man esteemed in the world.

Dcn. Steve: And I asked that every day for six weeks, and then I found the answer.

[overlapping 9/11 news reports]

Dcn. Steve: And the answer was, the airplane came into the building and that's why I was there.

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Dcn. Steve: That presented a huge problem for me because I was going to be ordained in a few short months.

Narrator: For the last five years, Steve had been studying in the diaconate program at Sacred Heart Major Seminary.

Dcn. Steve: And basically I had to make a choice: keep the job and go back to the east coast or quit the job and get ordained. And it wasn't even close for me. I quit the job and ended up being ordained. So I was looking for work.

Narrator: Being forced to look for work ended up being a really good thing for Steve.

Dcn. Steve: And as it turns out, the gentleman downriver, who was very famous at the time and owned quite a few different businesses, was looking for a lawyer.

Narrator: The “gentleman downriver” was Heinz Prechter, a renowned German entrepreneur and philanthropist who is credited for bringing the concept of car sunroofs to the U.S. and who was a major manufacturer of automotive products. He was also a close friend of the Bush family. For nearly ten years Steven worked for Heinz as his general counsel.

Narrator: Stephen was given his choice to be General Counsel of the Army or General Counsel of the Navy, and because he had been in the army for four years in Germany and two years in the reserves, he chose the army.

Narrator: As the chief legal officer for the Department of the Army, Steve oversaw all the lawyers that worked in the army, both military and civilian. From a supervisory situation, the General Counsel of the army is the highest-ranking attorney in the army.

Dcn. Steve: So the Judge Advocate General has a dotted line to the Army General Counsel and a direct line to the Chief of Staff of the Army. So I basically sat on top of a pile of 5,000 lawyers. And it was a real hoot.

Narrator: There were a lot of things that were a “hoot” to Steve about the job. In the Pentagon, everyone is given a rank. Out of the 23,000 employees in the Pentagon, Steven was number 42, which meant that if the 41 men or women before him were to perish, he would be the Secretary of Defense. And because all those nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate serve in a four-star rank for protocol purposes, Steve was given the four-star general treatment.

Dcn. Steve: I got to the Pentagon the end of July. So for six weeks it was all fun and games. You know, people were calling me sir, people were opening doors for me, whenever I went to a meeting, there was a name tag. My name tag was on the place where I was to sit. I always sat to the right of the secretary. It was all very — it was really quite amazing.

Dcn. Steve: I traveled to Virginia Beach where the seminar was and we expected to begin the seminar the morning of the 11th of September. So I'm up and ready to go. I'm sitting in my seat for the kickoff presentation, which was to be done by Alberto Gonzalez, who at the time was the White House Counsel, who was the president's chief lawyer. And Mr. Gonzalez came out to the podium and he said that I'm sorry to announce, but the conference is canceled. I have to return to Washington immediately. And if you would like to know why, return to your hotel rooms and turn on your TVs.

[various 9/11 news reports]

Dcn. Steve: And when I got back to my hotel room and turned the TV on, that's when I saw a plume of smoke coming out of the side of the Pentagon and watching what was going on with just horrifying to me.

Narrator: Steve immediately tried to phone the office but the system at the Pentagon had entirely collapsed and phones weren’t working. Steve had to get back, but he was in Virginia Beach, which is about three hours from Arlington, Virginia. He had no rental car and airplanes were obviously grounded, so Steve did the only thing he could to get back. He packed up his bags and hitchhiked back to DC.

Dcn. Steve: The very next day, I went to the Pentagon, which was Wednesday the 12th, and it was a completely different Pentagon than what I had left. Obviously, none of the employees were there. That building houses 23,000 employees for the Department of Defense. And it's pretty empty when there's nobody in there except the senior officials. And since I was one, they let me in. And I surveyed the damage and all I could see were these individuals in black suits, black jumpsuits, black helmets, and machine guns basically patrolling the hallways. And I had never seen that before. I knew that was not normal uniform of any of the services. It was basically the uniform adopted by the Pentagon protective force because of the event. So it became very clear that there was an awful lot to be done in the immediate days following. And I rolled up my sleeves and began doing whatever I could do as the Army's General Counsel to deal with the event.

Narrator: The third plane in the September 11 attacks destroyed the western face of the Pentagon. The impact punched a hole through layers of limestone, brick, concrete, blast-resistant geotextiles, and reinforced steel columns. Flames burst through the roof reaching twice the size of the five-story target. 125 people inside the Pentagon and all 64 on board the aircraft were killed.

While first responders searched rubble for remains, and fought the fire that lingered days after the attack, while medical staff treated the injured, Steve sought to serve in both legal and spiritual capacities.

Dcn. Steve: Over the next several months, there were two things that I spent a lot of time doing. One was attending funerals on behalf of the secretary. Secretary of the Army went to a number of funerals initially for people who were killed in the Pentagon and who were Department of the Army, either civilians or officers or enlisted people. It got to the point where he just couldn't take it anymore. So he asked me if I would go in his stead and I agreed. Of course, being a deacon and being involved in the funeral liturgies and all that kind of thing, kind of prepared me for that mission.

Narrator: One of those funerals was for Michigan native, Major Kip Taylor, someone who Steve had grown close to in those initial weeks. On September 13th, President Bush came to a meeting with survivors and families at the Pentagon and went immediately to Major Kip Taylor’s pregnant widow, and embraced her. The two were crying in each other's arms.

Dcn. Steve: The other thing that I did was, every day for several weeks, I would spend a couple hours on the side of the building. It was interesting because while tons of relief workers were out there doing their thing, there were a number of military chaplains who were there as well, providing spiritual counseling and everything else that you can think of in those situations. And so I went out to assist them. I soon realized that as a four-star equivalent in the Pentagon, these were captains and majors, mostly who were out there, all religious denominations who had various needs, that they were having a tough time getting met because their rank was quite low as far as the Pentagon goes. So I started making lists of the things that they need on the side of the building. I would go back into the building, put on my General Counsel's hat, give the list to my staff and say, Hey, make sure these guys get this stuff. And if you get any pushback, let me know when I'll make the call personally. So I was able to provide a lot of direct and indirect assistance through that kind of activity.

Narrator: But it was Mass, on the side of the Pentagon, just days after the attacks that was most profound encounter with Christ for Steve.

Dcn. Steve: On the 16th of September, the senior Catholic chaplain in the Pentagon, Colonel Phil Hill, celebrated Mass on the side of the building under one of the awnings. And the altar was situated such that all of the relief workers attended Mass and they were a gritty lot. I mean, they came just as they were, they didn't wash up or anything. They only had a few minutes to stay for Mass and then they went back in the building to bring out body parts, literally. They were seated under the awning with their backs to the Pentagon. Father Hill and I were obviously facing the people, which meant we were standing and looking directly into the building, looking directly into the damaged area where the airplane landed. So all throughout that Mass, which is probably the most touching liturgy that I've ever assisted at — you know, we talk in the archdiocese these days about “encounter grow witness.” Have you encountered the Lord? I can tell you on that day, when I was assisting at that Mass, I encountered the Lord in the most profound way that I have ever encountered him. And that is in each one of those rescue workers. When you look into their eyes, you could see the Lord. And then when it was time to elevate the host and elevate the chalice, I looked directly at the host and the chalice and worshipped the Lord. And as I did that, I could see straight through to the side of the building. And I got the most profound sense of what it was like to be on Calvary that day, because the side of the building looked to me like the pierced side of Christ. It was profound indeed. And, well, it made a lifelong impression.

Narrator: That impression bolstered Steve through his work in the next few years, helping his Pentagon, his country, his Church, to grieve in the aftermath of tragedy. And life returned, though not ever to what it was before, to a new normal, one where Steve would work as General Counsel of the Sioux St. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, in the Bush administration’s Department of Energy, and later, private practice. The impression would follow him when he moved back to Michigan serving Masses at numerous churches including St. James in Novi and St. John the 23rd in Redford. He brings with him that mystical experience from the Pentagon, that indelible Mass where he saw the Body of Christ, in the suffering and resilience of the American people.

Detroit Stories is a production of Detroit Catholic and the communications department of the Archdiocese of Detroit. Find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.