Yom HaShoah: Remembering the Holocaust. In the entrance, Jewish and Muslim leaders are joined by Christian clergy from many different denominations.
In his welcome, Father Ryan said, "we do our remembering tonight not for the sake of reopening painful wounds or of stirring up sentiments of hatred and revenge. No, we remember in order to honor those who died, to acknowledge historical reality, and above all to make sure that never again, in any part of the world, will others experience the horrors experienced by those millions of men and women who were systematically exterminated during the Holocaust."
The service begins with the reading of Psalm 23. A youth reader from Temple de Hirsch Sinai reads the psalm in Hebrew....
...as a youth reader from St. James Cathedral reads each verse in English. "Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil, for you are with me."
Alex Nguyen of St. James reads the testimony of a young soldier who was one of the first to enter Dachau when the camps were liberated in 1945. "It is difficult to know how to begin," Harold Porter wrote home to his parents on May 7, 1945. "I know you will hesitate to believe me no matter how objective and factual I try to be. I even find myself trying to deny what I am looking at with my own eyes…. It is easy to read about atrocities, but they must be seen before they can be believed."
Survivors of the Holocaust light the six candles of remembrance, representing the six million Jewish victims of the Nazi regime.
"In memory of helpless infants, children, and teenagers who were cut down like young trees before their time during the Holocaust, before they had a chance to experience life. We shall not forget!"
A young reader from Temple de Hirsch Sinai reads the famous poem "I Never Saw Another Butterfly," which was written by a child in the ghetto of Terezin, Theresienstadt, Czechoslovakia. An estimated 15,000 children passed through the ghetto, of whom fewer than 100 survived. "For seven weeks I’ve lived in here, / Penned up inside this ghetto," wrote Pavel Friedman in 1942. "But I have found what I love here. / The dandelions call to me / And the white chestnut branches in the court. / Only I never saw another butterfly."
Steve Adler of Temple Beth Am, a survivor of the Holocaust, sang the traditional prayer Oseh shalom bimramov.
Imam Abdullah Polovina of Bosnia offered a prayer for all victims of genocide.
Jon Lellelid of Temple de Hirsch Sinai sounds the shofar.
Rabbi Daniel Weiner of Temple de Hirsch Sinai prays the mourner's prayer, the Kaddish.
All present exchange a sign of peace - shalom.
Scott Abraham of Temple Beth Am sings Shalom rev.
At the conclusion of the service, the survivors spread light to all in the assembly.
Learn more about the Shoah. Visit the website of the United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, http://www.ushmm.org/. Visit the website of Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem, here http://www.yadvashem.org.il/.
