Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Roma (Agenzia Fides) – On this memorial day, our minds, hearts, and souls feel drawn to silence – a silence filled with memory, silence filled with the desire to find a meaning in this memory that returns with such great force, silence because there are not words strong enough to decry the terrible tragedy of the Shoah.
We should pay homage to the millions of Jews who, deprived of everything, above all their human dignity, were killed in the Holocaust. Over half a century has passed, and yet the memory should live on. In Auschwitz, as in many other places in Europe, we are overwhelmed by the echo of those heartrending cries of so many people. Men, women, and children call out to us from the abyss of horror that they have known. How can we turn a deaf ear to their cry? No one can forget or ignore what occured. No one can undermine its dimensions. We want to remember. However, we wish to remember with a reason, that is, to assure that evil will never again prevail, as occurred with the millions of innocent victims of Nazism.
How could man treat his fellow man with such disdain? Because he had reached the point of treating God with disdain. Only an ideology without God could plan and carry out the extermination of an entire people.
Jews and Christians share a great spiritual inheritance that comes from God's revelation of Himself. Our religious teachings and spiritual experiences demand that we conquer evil with good. We remember, but without any desire for revenge or to incite hatred. For us, remembering implies praying and working for peace and justice. Only in a world of peace, with justice for all, will we be capable of avoiding the repetition of our errors and the terrible crimes of the past.
The Catholic Church, inspired by the evangelical law of truth and love, and not by political considerations, is profoundly saddened by the hate, the acts of persecution and manifestations of anti-antisemitism aimed at Jews in every time and place. The Church disapproves of every form of racism as it is a denial of the image of the Creator which is present in every human person.
Thus, we fervently pray that the tragedy suffered by the Jewish people in the 20th century may lead to serenity and respect. Let us work towards a future free from antisemitism and full of love and harmony among all men of goodwill. (WT) (Agenzia Fides 6/2/2009)
