Holocaust Remembrance Week

Grate Heat by John Lynner Peterson

I frequently use the above photo in my writing because it says so much and yet doesn't coerce the viewers interpretation. It seems an appropriate art work to engage my readers in the commemoration of Holocaust Remembrance Week.

This week is Holocaust Remembrance Week with Holocaust Remembrance Day --- Yom HaShoah --- from sundown this Wednesday through sunset this Thursday. It is crucial that we remember. That we mourn. That we say, "never again." 

I am indebted to my Facebook friend, Rodney Allen Reeves, pastor in Portland, OR for bringing to my attention the text and choir anthem below.

"I believe in the sun even when it is not shining.

I believe in love even when feeling it not.

I believe in God even when God is silent."

The anthem "Even When God is Silent" composed by Michael Horvit, has a poignant text by an anonymous author. It was discovered written on a wall in a hidden area of a building in Germany in 1988, believed to have been written 50 years earlier during Kristallnacht, the Night of the Crystal Glass, November 9, 1938, when about 90 Jews were killed or seriously injured, plus 1000 Jewish owned shops, 200 Jewish homes and 76 synagogues were completely destroyed and 191 additional synagogues set on fire. 

We remember so that such acts never happen again.