Holocaust and Hiroshima Remembrance Observed
This Sunday
8 and 10 AM worship at First United Methodist
Church Sunday, August 3,
includes candle-lighting and a Time of
Remembrance for the Holocaust and the
Nuclear Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,
August 6 and 9, respectively,
1945. The remembrance lifts up the crucial
witness of survivors and the passing
of that witness to new generations. Holocaust
Survivor Ela Weissberger spoke
in Sunday worship two weeks ago.
Jewish liturgy observes “Yom Hashoah” (Day of
Holocaust Remembrance) much
Closer to Passover and therefore to Easter.
That reminds us Easter historically
leads to a mood of Christian triumphalism deadly
to Jews through the centuries
and placing special responsibility on us to
regard other faith traditions, peoples
and cultures with confession of our own sins
before judgment of anyone else’s.
It has been written, “It was hard to win an
atrocity contest in the 20th century.”
