c. 1997 Religion News Service
WASHINGTON _ Here is the text of the address delivered Monday (Oct. 20) by Orthodox Christian Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum:
To our beloved sisters and brothers in the Lord, To our friends and all who seek God’s love: May the Lord have mercy on us all. May the memory of those who died in the Holocaust be eternal.
We are moved to address you today conscious of our tour of this great museum of human suffering and human triumph. Our modesty is touched by the extraordinary achievement that this monument represents to the spirit of truth and the depth of human pain that has plagued this century.
We address you this day with mixed emotions, joyful at being here with you to bask in the fruits of those Jews and Orthodox Christians who have worked so tirelessly for understanding between our houses, that our reasoning together might lead to mutual respect and love for one another.
We are also deeply moved, saddened by what we have seen and experienced here today. We have seen the face of evil, an evil that we note with profound sorrow. However, we have today seen this hideous evil transformed, preserved by the power of love and memory. This place resolves us to assure all humankind that the unfathomable, unspeakable terror of genocide will never again enter into the realm of human action.
The images of this place, the terror of which we glimpse but for a moment here, was suffered in the unspeakable depths of living images of God _ men, women and children. To even attempt to contemplate this depth of human suffering is almost too much to bear. Yet we must try. We must understand that such depravity of human action was caused by a deprivation of human spirit. We cannot help but see in this place that Jews and Christians bear a special responsibility toward the hope and guarantee that this terrible evil must never again take root within the human psyche.
As Jews and Christians, we have a special responsibility toward preserving a common memory of this Holocaust and of others as well, that they might be avoided. Our history together is plagued by too many sad instances of fear and loathing and yet it is, here and there, rich with numerous examples of the Almighty’s love for us as individuals and as peoples. Were it not so, the fratricide we know was our inheritance whose evil fruits we see here, could not now be transformed into an icon of love and fraternal unity.
The story of Yolanda Willmorable brother in the Lord, Bishop Chrysostomos of Zakynthos, who when forced to list the Jews of the island by the Nazi authorities wrote but one name _ his own _ are the true lessons of love. They are icons of Christ’s truth, spoken with courage to the dark principalities and powers of this world.
In this sacred memorial to the Holocaust, the singular icon of our century’s evils has been transformed into an instrument of spiritual renewal. In repenting of our species’ most terrible crimes, we begin to find the road toward the love for one another that has eluded us for so much of our collective histories. That is the highest achievement of this great museum. In this structure’s evocation of the dark nadir of human depravity, this nation has enshrined a memorial to an evil that sadly has echoed in too many times and places of this fading century.
In creating this memorial, and framing this icon of evil as the antithesis of humanity, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has simultaneously created an icon of human hope. The museum has assured the posterity of human memory that it will never forget its darkest moments so that it might always strive to live out its highest aspirations.
Our humble person is shattered by the experience of this sacred memorial just as we were when we visited Yad Vashem in Israel. We respect the role of Israel as a guarantor of the Jewish people’s existence.
Since every person is created in the image and likeness of God, the evildoers and the good, the perpetrators and the victims, we are left to sort out the difference between obedience to the will of God, and contradicting the commandments of love that are planted by Him in our hearts.
The dreadful indifference of so many peoples as their neighbors were taken away against their will comprises a thorn in the side of the history of the human race. The thorn in Humanity’s side is its persistent weakness in its relationship with God. The bitter truth for so many Christians of that terrible time was that they could not connect the message of their faith to their actions in the world. They were unable to manifest their faith from their deeds.
The Ecumenical Patriarchate has sought to remind her spiritual children and all who profess a love for the Divine, that there has never been a greater need for religious people to go out into the world and witness the true fruits of the Spirit, among which are love, joy and peace.
We boldly proclaim to all, to our own spiritual children and to our brothers and sisters in the entire Oikoumene, that silence in the face of injustice, silence in the shadows of helpless suffering, silence in the darkness of Auschwitz’s bitter night will never again be allowed. True Christian faith ought to be manifest toward every people of faith, any faith. For his obligation is the preservation of human life with every sacrifice, even with the sacrifice of his own life.
Many say that this suggests a level of faith that is impossible to achieve. But we are creatures who are possessed of a self-reflexive understanding of ourselves. We have the knowledge of the difference between good and evil. We shall know joy in the Lord in our desire to do His will.
The rescuers of Jews and others from the fires of evil on earth overcame the bitter snare of fear and faithlessness, self-interest and hatred. They overcame evil with good.
All who died in the Holocaust are martyrs, witnesses that point the way for us to God’s love.
May their memory be eternal.
DEA END RNS
