YOM HA SHOAH AND OTHER TIMES FOR PRAYER
May 4, 2008 Summit UU Fellowship
Rev. Kathleen A. Green
“I didn’t expect it to be beautiful: well-made, rosy brick buildings, doors with handsome woodwork trim, healthy trees lining the streets. The sky, on our first day in Auschwitz, was an unbearably cheerful blue.”
And so begins the story of an interfaith gathering at Auschwitz by Barbara Hoag Gadon.
“I had already met people, shared a few meals with them. We talked of our fears going in: Can I handle this? What should I feel? Why am I here? I liked some people, disliked others. But before we went in, something shifted. Everyone suddenly seemed incredibly dear.
Some of us were Jews who had lost family, or whose families survived the camps, or who missed being here by a fluke. Some were Poles whose families complied with the Nazi army, or resisted, or lost their homes when the town was cleared out for Nazi officers. Some were Germans whose parents had participated in the Nazi movement, or worked in the resistance, or were too afraid to do anything. Some, like me, had no blood ties to what happened here. I wore my chalice to remember the Unitarian Service Committee, which began ushering refugees out of Europe in 1940.
As we moved through the exhibits on the grounds, our tour guide—a smartly dressed young Polish woman—would explain the meaning of where we stood. This is where they held roll call. This is where they hanged prisoners who tried to escape. The gas used in the gas chambers is called Zyklon B—here under this glass you can see a can of it, what the pellets look like. She explained to us how it was used, who made it—Bayer, of Bayer Aspirin—how it reacted with human skin, how efficient it was.
I had been to the Holocaust Museum in Washington. I had seen exhibits like these. I thought I would be all right. But when we entered the room where—how else do you say this?—they collected mounds of women's hair for the manufacture of blankets and clothing, I saw a woman's whole braid, a rusted clasp, and my heart tore open again.
We were taken into barracks past slatted wooden shelves that three, six, or even twelve prisoners had used for beds. We saw gouges in a ledge where prisoners had eaten the wood. We were taken into a gas chamber. We walked down into the scarred, gray room with neat round holes in the ceiling where cans of Zyklon B were dropped. And then we walked back out into the bright skies, into the mild air.
We gathered around an oddly shaped pond in the spot where the Nazis burned the bodies of their victims. There are ashes in it still. Some people lit candles. Father Tchaikofsky, a priest from a nearby Polish order, made a formal apology on behalf of the Catholic church that went much, much further than the Pope's. He spoke of the way the Gospels had been distorted and used for evil purposes, how the church had colluded and evaded its responsibility, how it had helped the spread of anti-Semitism that exists even today in Poland. "Indifference is a sin," he said. Jews wept, saying they had been waiting their whole lives to hear something like this. Germans wept, Poles wept, for the shame and the secrets and the guilt that they carried—even as the children and grandchildren of the people involved in this war. Then all of us wept—even those of us who wrestled with the powerful urge to say that this wasn't our fault, that what happened here had nothing to do with us.
Each day of the retreat, we sat in the center of Birkenau, where the trains used to unload prisoners. We sat on our bright turquoise prayer cushions on the spot where the arriving prisoners were "selected"—left, to the gas chambers, right, to the barracks. Or to experiments. Or to God knows what. People took turns chanting names of those who died here.
Coming to a place like Auschwitz, with all of our differences, in all of our brokenness, we realize that we carry in our own persons the pain of the world, the pain that we usually do not feel strong enough to face. Only when we face it together do we have any chance of becoming whole.”
Yom Ha Shoah is Holocaust Remembrance Day. This year it was observed by many on May 1. Though it is disturbing, uncomfortable, and painful, we must remember, all of us, the tragedies and pain that befall our sisters and brothers. Though my maternal grandfather’s family was Jewish and my husband’s family is Jewish, I don’t have a personal experience with the holocaust. Yet I do have the stories of the millions of people who were, and still are, effected by the destruction and devastation of such a genocide . The days of my claiming, “that’s not my problem – it’s got nothing to do with me or my family” are over. As a Unitarian Universalist I recognize my connection with all of humanity and my connection with Yom Ha Shoah.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” and “Until all are free none are free”. We are connected and their pain is our pain too. Our pain is a reminder that we are alive and connected. In our pain, we can speak out, we can look within, and we can pray. Yes, pray!
The National Day of Prayer was, ironically, May 1. I shared with our Adult RE class last week about an article in the Union Tribune about the National Day of Prayer. There is concern being voiced by Jewish groups and other religious, yet non-Christian, organizations that "What began as President Truman's declaration of a National Prayer Day for all Americans is now excluding and dividing us on religious lines." "The National Day of Prayer has been hijacked!" "The volunteers who organize the prayer events ... are required to pledge that they will only invite Christian clergy to officiate," The application to be a coordinator for National Day of Prayer events requires volunteers to make a statement of faith that is very narrowly drawn so that only a conservative evangelical Christian would be comfortable doing it.
Prayer does not belong to any one group of people. Prayer is not a practice that is owned by one religious group. You might have been brought up like me, perhaps like many others, being led to believe that there is a right way to pray; inferring there is a wrong way as well! Did any of you pray the popular children’s bedtime prayer: Now I lay me down to sleep? Scary!
I want to suggest to you that prayer is simply our heart’s song and there is no one right way to pray. Prayer can be chanted, sung, spoken spontaneously, or recited from inspiring text. It can be done with our whole bodies, in silence, on our knees, while we’re driving, in solitude, in community. Prayer is our heart’s song. And it’s not just for times of tragedy.
I’ve read that there are basically four contexts for prayer: conflict, sorrow, peace, and joy. That just about does it, doesn’t it? Prayer is good for any time. Making room for our heart’s song during difficult times like Yom Ha Shoah, during our sacred time of Joys & Sorrows, during times in our life when we are overwhelmed with a sense of joyful gratitude – making room for prayer is essential for our well-being. It provides the balance that our strong intellect and reason need for us to be fully human – to be whole.
There’s no need to get stuck on the particulars – the structure – of the prayer. All that is needed is an attitude of openness. Without such a posture, all of the words, the cadence, the custom, the style, the method, mean nothing.
A story from an eighteenth century Hebrew book illustrates this point:
A young man wanted to become a blacksmith. So he became an apprentice to a blacksmith, and learned all the necessary techniques of the trade: how to hold the tongs, how to life the sledge, how to smite the anvil, even how to blow the fire with the bellows. Having finished his apprenticeship, he was chosen to be employed at the smithy of the royal palace. However, all his skill and knowledge in handling the tools were of no avail and his delight came to an end when he discovered that he had failed to learn to kindle the spark.
Making room for prayer is essential for the well-being of atheists, agnostics, pagans, Christians, you and me, and the men and women with Barbara Hoag Gadon, bearing witness at Auschwitz.
“We came at last to a courtyard and stood before the Execution Wall. Here, candles are kept burning. There are always fresh flowers. My friend Naomi was serving as rabbi for us during the retreat, but she was in tremendous shock. She was supposed to lead the service, and she could barely speak. She began singing in a broken voice. Others began to sing with her. Other religious leaders joined her up front—another rabbi, a swami in orange robes, a sheik, a Lakota Sun Dancer, several Zen masters, a Lutheran pastor—all offering chants and prayers of mourning, healing, and peace. Native speakers recited the Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead, in Japanese, German, Italian, French, Dutch, English, Polish, Hebrew, and Aramaic. Our different bodies—tiny Japanese women, big, blond German men, dark, light, heavy, slim—bowed left, right, center, singing louder and louder: The spirit that pervades all life, no matter what its outward form, is one. And therefore, we are one. And I knew in a deeper way what we are trying to do as Unitarian Universalists. We proclaim that there is unity in our diversity, that in our diversity is tremendous beauty and strength. I stood in a place that had tried to crush the beauty of human difference with brutal efficiency, but we, by our very bodies, were proclaiming the beauty of human difference. I always thought unity in diversity was a wonderful ideal, but I didn't expect it to be so beautiful.”
May each and every one of us embrace the incredible beauty of diversity. May you embrace your heart’s song and the idea and practice of prayer. The time has come to no longer dismiss it as something for “others”. Claim it, make room for your heart’s song, and connect with brothers and sisters in pain, in gratitude, in joy, in prayer.
Shalom and Amen.
BENEDICTION - Edward Searl
Humbly we stand in the face of death.
Confidently we stand with Life.
Our strength is the strength of many.
Indeed, it is the strength of all humanity throughout all time
Because we share one fate and a great compassion.
May understanding go with, and peace, too,
That we may live together in charity, compassion, peace, and joy.
In this spirit, let us – individually and together – go forth to live, to love, and to pray.
