Holocaust Remembrance Day
This coming week, May 5th, is Holocaust Remembrance Day. This is a day we set aside to remember and learn about the horrors of the Holocaust. We remember the victims of the Holocaust, and honor all the martyrs as well as the survivors.
Here is a beautiful webiste sharing some information on this important day:http://www.holidays.net/holocaust/. Additionally, below, I have a post called Speaking about the Unspeakable where I have written letters to those who perished, and survived during this dark period of history. (see my post of April 25, 2005.)
Each year, the Holocaust seems more rather than less distant to me. As I see the world changing, new aliances being formed, govermental restrictions, and people being less tolerant of those who are different, this day of rememberance is a day with great impact and significance.
Please help me to remember this day, in your own way, by posting on this blog, visiting an number of websites dealing with this subject, or participating in a service in your own community to honor the Day of Remembrance.
Thank you for your minds.
Here is a beautiful webiste sharing some information on this important day:http://www.holidays.net/holocaust/. Additionally, below, I have a post called Speaking about the Unspeakable where I have written letters to those who perished, and survived during this dark period of history. (see my post of April 25, 2005.)
Each year, the Holocaust seems more rather than less distant to me. As I see the world changing, new aliances being formed, govermental restrictions, and people being less tolerant of those who are different, this day of rememberance is a day with great impact and significance.
Please help me to remember this day, in your own way, by posting on this blog, visiting an number of websites dealing with this subject, or participating in a service in your own community to honor the Day of Remembrance.
Thank you for your minds.
6 Comments:
Thanks for the reminder. It is day we should all remember.
I read those letters you wrote. The one to the Yiddish grandmother was awesome. I think the voice and tone of the Yiddish speaker is captured well.
No words adequately express emotional reaction to this most inhuman episode. I can only light a figurative candle and think about the "banality of evil" taken to this extreme.
I grew up with a dad haunted all his life by the images of World War II and the Concentration Camps his unit liberated. I've met too many people with those numbers tatooed on their forearms. I will always remember that hyper-nationalism, scapegoating, intolerance, and the belief that some people should have fewer rights than others can turn a liberal democratic society into a killing field.
When the movie Schindler's List came out, I saw it at Universal City in LA. Aside from it being an incredibly powerful movie in and of itself...it was the conversation afterwards that cemented the event into my brain. And I don't know that I have heard the film's title or a mention of the Holocaust since then, that I don't think of that conversation.
When the film was over, and the final credit had rolled up the screen, most of the audience continued to sit there in silence or simply weeping. I noticed the two women sitting next to me seemed extraordinarily moved by the event. And while I don't remember precisely what I said to initiate the conversation, I can tell you that these women slowly lifted their eyes to meet mine, as the younger of the two women told me that the older woman with her -- her mother -- was a Holocaust survivor. It was a brief, but emotional exchange, and essentially she said that as artistically well-done and as realistic as the film was...and the honor that it paid to the survivors and those who helped save countless lives...that there are no words or pictures that could ever describe the horror of that period in time.
Not long after that conversation, we went to visit the Simon Weisenthal Museum. And again, it profoundly impacted me. I can speak rather assuredly that I will probably never in my lifetime experience anything remotely similar to the horrors and atrocities that were committed at that time.
I think that my best response is to treat each person I meet with respect and to remember that while I may not know them, that there is someone who loves them and cares deeply for them. There is a parent or friend or child or spouse who thinks they are the most dear person in the world. I will try to measure my actions and words toward them to think how I would want people to treat my children...or spouse...or parents...or friends.
No, I can't go back and change that dark and disgusting period in world history. And no, I can't change how other individuals and cultures treat others. But what I can do is try to be a light in my corner of the world and to extend kindness and compassion to those I come in contact with.
Whit,
Thank you for your moving stories and comments. It is true, that those who had to bear witness to these actual horrors have memories beyond comprehension.
It is good to see that people, such as yourself, are here in the world to remember, and speak and honor the unspeakable.
Thank you.
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