Friday 27 January 2023

Psalm 124

Background

As a white British Christian the horrors of the Holocaust can feel impossible to comprehend. The hate, violence, destruction and inhumanity that was wreaked on the Jews feels so alien. Yet we know it to be true: some of us will have met survivors, some will have visited death camps, and some will have had relatives who we at the liberation of the camps. So on this day we join to remember the Holocaust.

The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust encourages remembrance in a world scarred by genocide. Holocaust Memorial Day on 27 January remembers the six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust, alongside the millions of other people killed under Nazi persecution of other groups and all the people killed during more recent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur. 

Today, 27 January, marks the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp.

Today we read from the Hebrew Scriptures a text sacred to Jews, Muslims and Christians. We read of God’s response to a plague, in Scripture a plague of locusts destroying everything. On this day we remember the plagues of inhumanity that have destroyed millions and perhaps we can find something of God’s response to plagues that caused the Holocaust, that cause genocide.

 On this day we move from lament to hear God’s response to the suffering, the horrors, the deaths. We hear of God’s ways of pouring new life, new dreams, new hope and new presence into the lives of all who have been hurt.

To Ponder:

• The Church often has a bad reputation for anti-Semitism. How can we see this passage from the Hebrew Scriptures with titles of “God’s Response and Promise” and “God’s Spirit Poured Out” as good news for Jews whose Scripture this is?
• What do you think are appropriate responses for Christians to have to Holocaust Memorial Day? What should be avoided? (And why?)

Prayer

A time of silence seems to me to be the most appropriate form of prayer on this day.