In Memoriam

I've mentioned every year about the Holocaust Remembrance Day (my post) and how commemorating still has no ritual. This morning in the news I looked at the slideshow of the Jewish Museum in Berlin. I'd like to walk through it and experience it. There are things the world should never forget. Scriptures so often tell us to remember, to retell the stories.


I grew up next door to a Jewish family. The parents had these 'tattoos' on their arms, a forever reminder of a time when persons were unnamed, and instead numbered. There are plenty of surviving pictures telling the story of this horrific time when one's identity as a Jew was attempted to be wiped out.

I used to have a timeline on a wall. As I learned events in history I'd add them to the timeline. Unfortunately these catastrophes, ethnic cleansings, the destruction of domination - one group over another ... crucifixions ... have gone on throughout time.

As my friend Ellen has said, "I believe it is an act of faith to remember and tell the stories and to recount how beauty and life have been called forth from chaos once again. And, to dare to reflect on the mystery that the gospel is far, far bigger and better than we can dare to dream."