#Majdanek Concentration camp

[steveyockey]

While visiting the Majdanek concentration camp I, at that time a still fervent Zionist, had a strange revelation which I still cannot explain. While standing in the gas chamber—the walls covered in scratch marks and the hauntingly soft blue stains left behind by so many administrations of Zyklon B—it occurred to me: there was nothing ontologically evil about the perpetrators, nothing ontologically righteous or defeated about the victims; their fates were contingent on history. If this, even this, was contingent, then there must be something about the structure of the world that made it so.

When the Zone of Interest cuts to the Auschwitz of the present day, this memory rushed to the surface. That scene—long and wordless—seems to suggest that our contemporary atrocities will one day receive a similar memorialization, that such memorialization always sanitizes atrocity by placing it firmly in the past, even as we continue to live in a present it created; that we are, in turn, already sanitizing our own atrocities in the present. Even that, most chillingly, the Polish workers, like the Polish servants at the Auschwitz homestead, will continue to polish and clean Höss’s trophies. Höss and the Nazis may have lost the war, but present events make clear that their ideology lives on, polished up.

As the film ends with a cut to black, Mica Levi’s score fills the void: an ostinato of screams and trudging strings. The screams continue to pitch up, more voices added, a cacophony of screaming, and still the trudging line: history continues as one single catastrophe.

Walter Benjamin wrote that "Marx says that revolutions are the locomotive of world history. But perhaps it is quite otherwise. Perhaps revolutions are an attempt by the passengers on this train – namely, the human race – to pull the emergency brake.” The train: a resonance he could not yet have known. Unlike other concentration camps, the Nazis did not have time to destroy Majdanek prior to their retreat from the rapidly advancing Soviet forces. The bulk of the camp is not only intact, but theoretically still operational. The brake has not been pulled. Can you smell it? We’re in the zone of interest. We never left.

[thetepes]

You're going to fucking sit with me through something.

I want you to fucking sit and take this in. Sit and listen to it. Watch her fucking type it out.

Mage-danek. Majdanek.

Sit and fucking watch it. Watch her make that fucking joke. Tell me how funny it is. I want to hear how funny you think it is that concentration camps are. I want you to tell me how seriously she takes Nazis and what they fucking did.

I'm sure it will just be blown off as a joke, but I really want it people to sit and watch her chuckle to herself and repeat her little joke.

Get back to me with your thoughts because I'm sure they'll be fascinating.

[cursedreverie1945]

Today is trump's inauguration

MLK Day

It's also the 83rd anniversary of the Wannsee Conference.

The Wannsee Conference was held OTD in 1942, in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee. It was organized by Reinhard Heydrich, at the request of Hermann Göring, to discuss and coordinate the implementation of the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question,"which was the plan to systematically exterminate European Jews. Key attendees included:

Reinhard Heydrich: As the chief of the Reich Main Security Office (RSHA), Heydrich was the main architect of the Final Solution. He called and chaired the conference to ensure coordination among various Nazi departments in the extermination plan.

Adolf Eichmann: A key figure in organizing the logistics of the Holocaust, Eichmann was the head of the RSHA department responsible for Jewish affairs and coordinating the deportation of Jews to concentration camps, ghettos, and death camps. He took minutes during the meeting. One copy survived and it wasn't even a full copy.

Heinrich Müller: As head of the Gestapo, Müller was involved in the coordination of secret police operations during the Holocaust.

Karl Eberhard Schöngarth: A commander in the SS and police in the General Government (part of occupied Poland), Schöngarth was actively involved in the implementation of mass shootings and deportations of Jews.

Josef Bühler: As the State Secretary for the General Government, Bühler advocated for the inclusion of Poland in the Final Solution plans, expressing eagerness to "solve" the Jewish question in his jurisdiction promptly.

Roland Freisler: A representative of the Reich Ministry of Justice, Freisler was involved in ensuring that legal frameworks were in place for the persecution and deportation of Jews.

Otto Hofmann: As the head of the SS Race and Settlement Main Office, Hofmann was responsible for racial policies that included identifying and rounding up Jews for deportation.

At the Conference, Bühler remarked “...that the General Government would welcome it if a start were to be made on the final solution of this question in the General Government, because here transportation does not pose a real problem nor would the deployment of a labor force interfere with the process of this operation. Jews should be removed from the area of the General Government as quickly as possible, because it is here that the Jew represents a serious danger as a carrier of epidemics, and in addition his incessant black marketeering constantly upsets the country's economic structure. Of the approximately 2.5 million Jews in question, the majority are anyway unfit for work.”

Soon after the Conference, the Holocaust entered into a new, more deadly phase. Among other events, Operation Reinhard was a direct result. Named for Heydrich, who was assassinated just months after the conference, it was intended to kill every Jew.

Operation Reinhard built a series of death camps called Operation Reinhard Camps: Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka. Three other pre-existing camps, Chelmno, Majdanek, and Auschwitz II, were also put to work towards this goal.

Ultimately, 90% of the Jews of Poland would not survive.

May all of these sonsofbitches never find rest.

Pictured, Reinhard and Lina Heydrich the day before the attempt on his life 26 May 1942. He would die on 04 June 1942.

[mariacallous]

The Counterfeit Countess: The Jewish Woman Who Rescued Thousands of Poles During the Holocaust

World War II and the Holocaust have been the subject of many remarkable stories of resistance and rescue, but The Counterfeit Countess: The Jewish Woman Who Rescued Thousands of Poles during the Holocaust (Simon & Schuster, 2024) is unique. It tells the previously unknown story of “Countess Janina Suchodolska,” a courageous Jewish woman who rescued more than 10,000 Poles imprisoned by Nazi occupiers. Assuming the identity of a Polish aristocrat, Dr. Josephine Janina Mehlberg (born Pepi Spinner) worked as a welfare official, served in the Polish resistance, and persuaded the SS to release thousands from the Majdanek concentration camp. Drawing on Mehlberg’s own unpublished memoir, supplemented with prodigious research, Elizabeth B. White and Joanna Sliwa, both historians and Holocaust experts, have reconstructed the story of this remarkable woman.

[contremineur]

Yva, subject and date unknown

Yva was the professional pseudonym of Else Ernestine Neuländer-Simon (26 January 1900 – disappeared June 1942 and officially declared dead on 31 December 1944), a German Jewish photographer deported by the Gestapo in 1942 and murdered, probably in the Majdanek concentration camp.

from here

Stolperstein outside Schlüterstraße no. 45 in Berlin, Yva's last home

from here

[mychemicalzomance]

a real pain mini analysis (spoilers)

watched "a real pain" directed by jesse eisenberg starring himself and keiran culkin today and it was undoubtedly my favorite movie made in 2024. so much of the story of these character's lives is told in a short and completely linear 1hr 30min run time, while acting as a beautiful observational piece about moving on from tragedy.

most of the movie is spent asking the question: how have we moved on from past genocides as a society? how are we able to continue to move through our lives as if these devastations didn't happen? this is repeatedly brought up by benji, played by keiran culkin, who is completely incapacitated from moving on from the past, specifically with how his grandmother who survived the holocaust had died. so much so that it is revealed about half way through the film that he tried to end his life by overdose six months prior to when the trip takes place. the main rift between benji and his cousin, david (jesse eisenberg), is that benji believes david has changed to become less emotional and more detached from his own and their family's pain. david is jealous, however resentful, of benji's capacity to feel emotion regarding the past, and how he is able to be honest with himself and the people around him.

near the end of the movie, the two cousins and their tour group visit the polish concentration camp Majdanek. this black hole of a historical landmark is located only 2 miles away from the town centre, as stated by the tour guide. only 2 miles away from where people are continuing to go about their lives while less than 100 years prior, one of history's greatest tragedy's took place.

not too long after, they visit where their grandmother used to live. they try to place a stone at her doorstep as an act of sentimentality, but are asked to remove it because someone new lives there. the world has moved on.

by the end of the movie, they are back in the airport, ready to return to their normal lives, and to let things go back to how they were before they left. david goes back to his wife and kids, and benji presumably goes back tothe basement of his mom's house. after revisiting a major attrocity of human kind and a deep trauma in their bloodline, they return to their lives.

[abwwia]

Gertrud Kauders (1883-1942) into a middle-class German-speaking Jewish family in Prague, Austro-Hungarian Empire. Killed in Majdanek concentration camp in 1942. via W #PalianSHOW

[un-disco-por-dia]

93 / 365

"One is glad to be of service" / April Rain

Year: 2014

Country: 🇷🇺 (Russia)

Genre: Post-Rock

Music of April Rain is pain converted to sounds. I couldn't agree more with this statement. April Rain has an incredible ability to make the guitar cry, if such a thing is possible. Especially on this album, where pain combines with hope, like rays of light coming through leaky walls. As if being stubborn was the only thing that could save us. Because pain and hope are an inherent part of the human condition. It's obligatory to mention the references in the album to Robbie Williams and the Majdanek concentration camp, two examples that can illustrate this idea. Prepare yourselves to sob.

Fave song ⭐: "Last Cry Of A Whale Casted Ashore"

[thetepes]

Anyway, how about that concentration camp pun Lily made in her video?

That was a slap in the face.

Magedanek - Majdanek 

[allycat75]

If Hollywood promises not to fuck this up, how about making this amazing, original story.

Possibly Melanie Lynskey? Alison Brie, maybe?

[cursedreverie1945]

How did women become guards at the concentration camps?

Of the 55,000 guards who served in Nazi concentration camps, about 3,700 were women. In 1942, the first female guards arrived at Auschwitz and Majdanek from Ravensbrück. The year after, the Nazis began conscripting women because of a guard shortage.

The German title for this position, Aufseherin (plural Aufseherinnen), means female overseer or attendant.

How were they recruited?

Female guards were generally low class to middle class and had no work experience; their professional background varied: one source mentions former matrons, hairdressers, street car ticket takers, opera singers, or retired teachers. Volunteers were recruited by ads in German newspapers asking for women to show their love for the Reich and join the SS-Gefolge ("SS- Retinue" an SS support and service organisation for women). Additionally, some were conscripted based on data in their SS files. The League of German Girls (BDM) acted as a vehicle of indoctrination for many of the women.

Many SS men and SS women were executed by the Soviets when they liberated the camps, while others were sent to the gulags. Only a few SS women were tried for their crimes compared to male SS. Most female wardresses were tried at the Auschwitz Trial, in four of the seven Ravensbrück Trials, at the first Stutthof Trial, and in the second and Third Majdanek Trials and from the small Hamburg-Sasel camp. At that trial all forty-eight SS men and women involved were tried.

One such woman was Jenny Wanda Barkmann.

Twenty four year old Jenny Wanda Barkmann was thought to be from Hamburg and was nicknamed "The Beautiful Spectre" by the camp inmates who considered her to be a ruthless killer. She was arrested in May 1945 at a railway station near Danzig trying to escape. At her trial she is reported to have flirted with her male guards and wore a different hairstyle each day.

She was hung for her crimes in 1946 at the ripe old age of 25. It was well deserved.

[franavu]

On today's episode of what the absolute fuck, turns out the Dutch security service spent literally decades spying on Dutch holocaust survivors and the Dutch Auschwitz Committee, a support and advocacy group for concentration camp survivors.

They were marked as an extremist organization and a possible threat to society with "communist" sympathies. And this happened until the 1980s; reading the article, it's worse than I expected after hearing about it, and absolutely disgraceful. Like, they reported on memorial services for the holocaust, and sent informers along on memorial trips to concentration camps. Because these were obviously severe threats to Dutch society /s.

Links to the story in English, it's a pretty good summary of the main article in Dutch:

In Dutch, from the national news service, and the investigative article that broke the story, it's paywalled, so I'll put the text under a cut:

Leden van het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité jarenlang gevolgd door de veiligheidsdienst: ‘Niemand heeft dit ooit geweten’

Teun Dominicus23 december 2023, 03:00

11–15 minuten

Joodse Amsterdammers die betrokken waren bij het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité, werden na hun terugkeer uit de kampen bespioneerd door de voorloper van de AIVD, blijkt uit onderzoek van Het Parool. Nabestaanden en het Auschwitz Comité zijn ontsteld. ‘Het feit dat je verslag doet van de mensen die stil kwamen staan bij hun familie die was afgeslacht, tart elk idee van beschaving.’

Berooid en beroofd: zo kwamen Joodse overlevenden van de vernietigingskampen in 1945 terug in Nederland. Familie en vrienden waren door de nazi’s vermoord. In hun huizen woonden vreemden die niet op hun terugkeer hadden gerekend. De gemeente Amsterdam presenteerde hun ook nog een erfpachtschuld voor de jaren die ze in de onderduik of kampen hadden gezeten. Kil en koud, was de ontvangst in het naoorlogse Nederland. Niemand had oog voor deze Holocaustslachtoffers.

Daar komt nu bij dat de Binnenlandse Veiligheidsdienst (BVD), de voorloper van de AIVD, Joodse Amsterdammers na terugkeer decennia scherp in de gaten heeft gehouden, zo blijkt uit archiefonderzoek van Het Parool. Vele Holocaustoverlevenden werden tot in de jaren tachtig door de dienst gezien als ‘extremisten’ en als een potentieel gevaar voor de democratie. Teruggekeerdenuit het kamp kwamen terecht in de kaartenbak van de veiligheidsdienst.

Lange tijd deed de BVD verslag van Holocaustherdenkingen: of die nou in het Joods Cultureel Centrum in Buitenveldert waren, in kamp Westerbork of op de Nieuwe Oosterbegraafplaats. Genoteerd werd wie aanwezig waren.

Marechaussee

Zo vertrok met een dag vertraging op donderdag 8 april 1965 van Schiphol een vliegtuig met Auschwitzoverlevenden naar de Poolse hoofdstad Warschau, zo blijkt uit het verslag van een informant die mee was op de reis. De groep van twintig personen reisde door naar het voormalige vernietigingskamp om daar aanwezig te zijn bij de twintigste bevrijdingsdag van het kamp. Kampoverlevende Jacques Furth legde er namens het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité een krans.

Op 13 april ging de groep ‘per autobus naar Krakau, kamp Majdanek en Lublin. Daar werden zoutmijnen, kerken, kastelen enz., bezichtigd’, aldus het reisverslag dat door de BVD is opgesteld.

Niet alleen de BVD bespioneerde het reisgezelschap. Zodra ze de douane op Schiphol waren gepasseerd, gaf de marechaussee reisgegevens door, onder vermelding van ‘lijst met personen die hebben deelgenomen aan de herdenking van de bevrijding van het concentratiekamp Auschwitz’, waarna de geheime dienst notities maakte voor de individuele dossiers.

Verzetsmensen over de vloer

Bestuursleden Jos Slagter en Annetje Fels-Kupferschmidt zijn twee van de mensen die door de BVD werden gevolgd. Samen waren zij opeenvolgend vanaf 1958 tot 1994 voorzitter van het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité.

Niemand van de generatie van de oprichters van het Comité leeft nog, maar sommige van hun kinderen wel. Bijvoorbeeld Chaja Polak. Geboren in 1941 was Polak twee jaar oud toen haar moeder Annetje Fels-Kupferschmidt en haar vader Hans Polak in april 1944 door de nazi’s werden opgepakt. Haar vader stierf in Dachau, maar haar moeder overleefde Auschwitz. De jonge Chaja bleef op het nippertje uit handen van de nazi's.

Ze heeft nu voor het eerst inzage in het BVD-dossier van Fels-Kupferschmidt en kan moeilijk geloven dat de veiligheidsdienst haar moeder in de gaten hield. “Zij kwam vooral op voor nazislachtoffers en hielp waar het kon,” zegt de inmiddels 82-jarige Polak.

Aan het gezin waarin ze opgroeide heeft ze warme herinneringen. “Thuis was veilig,” zegt ze. “Daar waren mensen die in het verzet hadden gezeten. Mijn tweede vader was niet-Joods en had in het verzet gezeten. Er kwamen veel verzetsmensen en Joden van over de hele wereld over de vloer: familie en vrienden die de kampen hadden overleefd.”

Dossiers vermelden wat het Auschwitz Comité tijdens vergaderingen besprak. Van alledaagse regelzaken – wie schrijft een brochure? – tot aan het opzetten van politieke acties. Zoals de protesten tegen de vrijlating van Willy Lages, de nazi die verantwoordelijk was voor de deportatie van 70.000 Joden. Een vergadering daarover vond in september 1966plaats bij bestuurslid Eva Tas thuis, in haar woning op de Amsteldijk. ‘Allen vonden het een schande, want deze man had tot aan zijn dood in de gevangenis behoren te blijven,’ schetst een informant de stemming binnen het comité.

Voor Polak is het wrang dat haar moeder is bestempeld als extremist, maar dat oorlogsmisdadiger Lages géén BVD-dossier heeft: ‘Dat zie ik als een heel groot onrecht.’

Inlichtingen van lokale politiekorpsen

Een andere zaak waar het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité zich hard voor maakte, was financiële tegemoetkoming voor Joodse overlevenden van de oorlog en nabestaanden. Pas in 1973, 28 jaar na het einde van de Tweede Wereldoorlog, kwamen zij in aanmerking voor een uitkering.

Met voorlichtingsbijeenkomsten lichtte het comité slachtoffers in over hun financiële positie. Op 25 april 1971 was er zo’n samenkomst in het Anne Frank Huis: een kleine vijftig mensen kwamen luisteren naar twee ambtenaren van de sociale dienst, aldus het BVD-verslag. Izak Stibbe, de penningmeester van het comité, vertelde daar dat hij ‘gedurende de oorlog in een aantal Duitse kampen was geweest’ en dat daardoor zijn gezondheid ‘geknakt’ was.

Voor zijn surveillancepraktijken kon de BVD ook rekenen op de politiekorpsen. Eva Furth, de secretaris van het Auschwitz Comité, zat op Bevrijdingsdag 1982 in een panel over ‘vrouwen in het verzet’, schrijft de inlichtingendienst van de Leidse politie aan de geheime dienst. De discussie was georganiseerd door het lokale 5 meicomité.

‘Dit is schandalig’

In het café naast het Namenmonument leest Jacques Grishaver voor het eerst hoe de BVD het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité heeft bespioneerd. Sinds 1998 is hij voorzitter van het Comité, op zijn revers zit de koninklijke onderscheiding die hij kreeg voor zijn inzet voor het Holocaust Namenmonument.

“Onder de aanwezigen veel Israëlieten,” leest hij zachtjes voor als hij de stukken onder ogen krijgt. Op tafel ligt het verslag van de Auschwitzherdenking in 1965 in de Haagse zaal Diligentia, met een lijst namen van Joodse aanwezigen. “Het is schandalig, eigenlijk.” Hij kijkt nog eens naar het blad. “Nee, het ís schandalig.”

“Niemand heeft dit ooit geweten,” vervolgt hij. “En als je het leest, is het eigenlijk om te huilen. Al die namen die je leest, dat zijn mensen die zo veel hebben meegemaakt. Ze hebben bijna allemaal hun familie verloren. En vervolgens werden ze als vijand van de staat in de gaten gehouden.”

“Ik denk dat dit aangeeft hoe men aankeek tegen Joden die waren teruggekomen. Ze hadden beter kunnen blijven en niet kunnen terugkomen. Dat is eigenlijk wat met deze dossiers wordt gezegd: vijfduizend Joden zijn teruggekomen en we hadden er eigenlijk niet op gerekend. Dat blijkt hier duidelijk uit.”

Communistische invloeden

De grote vraag is: waarom achtte de BVD het noodzakelijk het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité tientallen jaren te volgen? De AIVD laat desgevraagd schriftelijk weten niet in te gaan op vragen over individuele dossiers. De dienst wijst erop dat de BVD tijdens de Koude Oorlog onderzoek deed naar het communisme en dat ‘mogelijk onderzoek naar personen’ van het comité ‘in dat licht [kan] worden gezien’.

Blom en Slagter werden, als leden van de CPN, al voor de Tweede Wereldoorlog in de gaten gehouden door de Centrale Inlichtingendienst, de voorloper van de BVD. Beiden zaten tijdens de oorlog in het verzet, waren Joods, werden naar de kampen gedeporteerd en overleefden de Holocaust – Blom als enige van zijn familie, Slagters eerste vrouw werd in Auschwitz vermoord.

Als bestuurslid van de communistische verzetsstrijdersorganisatie Verenigd Verzet probeerde Blom via Slagter inderdaad invloed uit te oefenen op het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité. Het zette echter weinig zoden aan de dijk: steeds weigerden de niet-partijleden zich voor het karretje van de CPN te laten spannen, wist ook de BVD.

Grishaver vindt het onterecht dat het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité als communistische mantelorganisatie werd weggezet. “Ja, sommigen waren lid van de CPN, maar anderen ook niet.”

Hij wijst erop dat er door die beschuldiging lang weinig aandacht was voor het leed van de kampoverlevenden. Ook van het argument dat het optreden van de BVD ‘in de tijd’ gezien moet worden, moet hij weinig hebben. “Het waren andere tijden, maar het feit dat je van Auschwitzherdenkingen een verslag gaat maken, van de mensen die ernaartoe kwamen om stil te staan bij hun familie die was afgeslacht, om daar de BVD op te zetten, tart elk idee van beschaving. Dat is niet goed te praten, ook niet met de tijd.”

Als twintigjarige in het dossier

Aan het einde van het gesprek moet Chaja Polak bijkomen. Zij las dat de BVD gesprekken in de winkel van Cor Fels, haar tweede vader, afluisterde. Dat de dienst in 1958 Joodse communistische verzetsgroepen uit de Tweede Wereldoorlog in kaart bracht: ‘Joodse antifa-groeperingen’ staat erboven, gevolgd door namen van familie en vrienden van haar ouders, enkelen in Sobibor vermoord. En ze hoorde dat de BVD een dossier over háár heeft aangelegd: ze was amper twintig jaar oud toen ze in Israël familie ging opzoeken, een reis waar de dienst verslag van deed.

Maar uiteindelijk gaat het Polak niet om haar, maar om al die leden van het Nederlands Auschwitz Comité. “Ik vind dat al deze mensen,” zegt ze, verwijzend naar de bestuursleden van het comité, “die zich zo hebben ingezet om Auschwitz op de kaart te zetten en de wereld te laten weten wat daar is gebeurd, die zich hebben ingezet om de overlevenden financieel te steunen omdat ze na de oorlog voor het overgrote deel in armoede leefden, dat hun namen gezuiverd moeten worden van deze blaam.”

[contremineur]

Yva, Woman’s legs in stockings (1927)

Yva was the professional pseudonym of Else Ernestine Neuländer-Simon (26 January 1900 – disappeared June 1942 and officially declared dead on 31 December 1944), a German Jewish photographer deported by the Gestapo in 1942 and murdered, probably in the Majdanek concentration camp.

from here

Stolperstein outside Schlüterstraße no. 45 in Berlin, Yva's last home

from here

[cleoenfaserum]

GEORGE GALLOWAY on the ZIONIST GENOCIDE of the GAZIAN PEOPLE as explained by professor FINKELSTEIN.

825-1 https://youtu.be/X_pcyqXziNs

Who is professor Finkelstein?

Norman Finkelstein was born on December 8, 1953, in New York City, the son of Harry and Maryla (née Husyt) Finkelstein. Finkelstein's parents were Jewish. His mother grew up in Warsaw and survived the Warsaw Ghetto and the Majdanek concentration camp. His father was a survivor of both the Warsaw Ghetto and Auschwitz.

Norman Gary Finkelstein (born December 8, 1953) is an American political scientist and activist. His primary fields of research are the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the politics of the Holocaust. He is a graduate of Binghamton University and received his Ph.D. in political science at Princeton University. He has held faculty positions at Brooklyn College, Rutgers University, Hunter College, New York University, and DePaul University, where he was an assistant professor from 2001 to 2007.

825-2 https://ok.ru/video/7287628171827

[misfitwashere]

TIMOTHY SNYDER

APR 21

READ IN APP

The one time I was to meet Pope Francis, I had to wait. Others, more knowledgeable than me, will write memorials today. I want to share a single detail from one day in Rome, in January 2018.

The site was a Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, St. Sophia; the occasion was the conferring of the honors of the Blessed Martyr Omelian Kovch.

The namesake of this distinction was a Greek Catholic priest who rescued Jews during the German occupation, and who himself died inside the Majdanek concentration camp. While in Majdanek, Kovch wrote that he did not wish for anyone to intervene on his behalf, since he wished to minister to the needs of the dying: "They die in different ways, and I help them cross this bridge into eternity. Is this not a blessing? Is this not the most splendid crown that God could place on my head? Precisely so. I thank God a thousand times each day that He sent me here. I ask nothing more of Him. Do not be troubled, and do not lose faith on my part. Instead, rejoice with me. Pray for those who created this concentration camp and this system. They are the only ones that need prayers."

The award was for courage in ecumenical understanding, and it was a great honor to be among a small group of distinguished east Europeans that day, Ukrainians and a Pole. I was moved by the golden beauty of the interior of St. Sophia, and overwhelmed by the occasion. Perhaps naturally, I was thinking of myself, of what I would say to the pope when he arrived. Our common language was Spanish, which I speak very poorly, and I was rehearsing in my mind what I wanted to say, which was to thank him for recent statements about ecology, and to describe the little book I wanted to give to him. As I understood over the course of the morning, everyone wants to give something to the pope.

Awaiting Francis, I was sitting with the other honorees in a pew towards the front and on the left. The church was very full of people, sitting and standing. I noticed, though, that the people with disabilities were led carefully to the first pew on the right. In this setting, I was reminded of the practices of the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv, which is dedicated to the "martyrs and the marginalized," including the service of the disabled. I do not know whether Francis would have expected this particular arrangement when he entered the church. I can only report on what he did.

Francis was led down the aisle, resplendent in white, very erect, walking slowly and greeting people along the way. Just before he reached the sanctuary, he halted suddenly and turned to his right, noticing that pew. Then, as the rest of us waited, he walked to its far end, and bent himself to speak. He greeted each person in turn, touching them. As the people with whom he was conversing could not rise, he had to lower himself. So, over and over, Francis knelt down to look someone in the eye and to hold both of their hands in his. This took about fifteen minutes. It was a moment to think about others, and in that sense, for me, a liberation, from my own anxiety and selfishness.

Many words and much grandeur followed. But that moment is what I remember. None of us is perfect. Even Father Omelian Kovch was not perfect. Pope Francis was not perfect. The institution they represented has much to answer for. But imperfection can represent itself as service, in the acknowledgement that we can transcend ourselves when we see others first. 

“Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” When Francis made the rest of us wait so that he could greet the less fortunate, of course he was doing something symbolic. But such symbols matter, because in them we can glimpse something higher through something human, something that remains even as the memory of white garments and golden artifice fades.

[silvestromedia]

SAINTS FOR MARCH 25

St. Dismas, the Good Thief crucified with Christ on Calvary. Feastday March 25

St. James Bird, Blessed, 1593 A.D. English martyr. Born in Winchester and raised as a Protestant, he embraced the Catholic Church at the age of nineteen. James visited Douai College in Reims, but he returned to England. There he refused to take the Oath of Supremacy and was hanged, drawn, and quartered at Winchester in his native city. He was beatified in 1929.

St. Harold, 1168 A.D. Martyred child of Gloucester, England. He was reported to have been slain by Jews in the area, and was venerated as a martyr. The veneration of the child martyrs is often considered as an example of the pervasive anti-Semitism of the period.

Bl. Emilian Kovch, Roman Catholic Priest and Martyr. Parish priest in 1922 at Peremyshliany, Ukraine, a village of 5,000, most of whom were Jewish. An active priest, he organized pilgrimages and youth groups, and welcomed poor and orphaned children of all faiths into his home. When the Nazis invaded Ukraine, they began rounding up Jews. To save them, Father Emilian began baptizing them, and listing them as Christians. The Nazis were wise to this trick, and had prohibited it. Emilian continued, but was arrested by the Gestapo in December 1942. Deported to the Majdanek concentration camp in August 1943. There he ministered to prisoners, hearing confessions, and celebrating Mass when possible. He was Martyred in the ovens. Feastday Mar.25

St. Robert of Bury St. Edmunds, 1181 A.D. traditionally, a boy martyr of the Middle Ages whose death was blamed upon local Jews. He was supposedly kidnapped and murdered by Jews on Good Friday at Bury St. Edmunds, England. As was the case with other reputed victims of Jewish sacrificial rites, the story of Richard is entirely fictitious and owes its propagation to the rampant anti-Semitism of the period.

St. Kennocha, 1007 A.D. Nun of Scotland, also called Kyle or Enoch. She lived in a convent in Fife, Scotland, and is venerated in Glasgow.

St. Lucy Filippini, Co-foundress of the Italian institute of the Maestre Pie, the Filippine. With Rosa Venerini, Lucy started training schoolmistresses at Monte Fiascone. The institute evolved from this work.Roman Catholic Nun. Feastday Mar.25

ST. QUIRINUS