LIBERATION- AUSCHWITZ- PASSION WEEK- January of this year marked the 80th anniversary of the
liberation of the Nazi German concentration and extermination camp
Auschwitz-Birkenau, where over one million people were murdered, most of whom
were Jewish. It is fitting this Holy Week to ponder this horrid part of
history lest we forget and start all over again the discrimination and hatred mankind
is capable of.
80
years after the liberation, the world is again in crisis. We see in the world
today a great increase in antisemitism, and it was antisemitism that led to the
Holocaust. Jewish-Christian
values have been overshadowed worldwide by prejudice, fear, suspicion and fanaticism.
"The
act of remembering the evils of the past remains a vital task, and in so doing
we inform our present and shape our future," King Charles said during a
visit to the Jewish Community Centre in Krakow.
Until the liberation of some 7 thousand prisoners remaining at the
site of the camp by soldiers of the Red Army, the German Nazis murdered approx.
1.1 million people in Auschwitz, mostly Jews, but also Poles, the Roma, Soviet
prisoners of war, and people of other nationalities.
For the world today, Auschwitz is a symbol of the Holocaust and
the atrocities of World War II. In 2005 the United Nations declared 27
January as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Having visited it myself in 1998, I can testify that it is a
life-changing experience- one you never forget. And if all these neo-
Natzis, white suprematists, etc. were to visit, they would change their
attitude fast!
This Holy Week we pray that violence, hatred and down right ignorance be eradicated. And we
all need to look into our own hearts for where we have failed in judging others. Lord have Mercy on us all!
Art: Kataryna Shadrina- Ukraine ( Waiting for Salvation)
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