3586 days ago
There is a candle burning in my house today as we think about what World Holocaust Day means to us. For today is the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. I spent some of the weekend discussing what happened there with my daughter and the issues it raises for all of us today as we confront an alarming increase in anti-semitism but also the demonization of those following another religion, Islam.
3951 days ago
On this day in 1945 the Red Army entered Auschwitz to encounter industrial scale horrors. Hence today is World Holocaust Day, 24 hours to reflect and ponder. In this household, as in homes across the world, we are burning a candle as a sign that we will not forget.
It is important to make a positive effort not to forget when one faces a daily barrage from those who either deny the holocaust, those who seek to diminish its importance by claiming that numbers were inflated or, worst of all, those who trivialise it by describing any event as a holocaust.
There are places in the world where deaths occur driven by hatred, intolerance and anger. But perhaps only in Cambodia and Ruanda have we seen anything on the scale of the holocaust where genocide was committed against an entire race on an industrial scale with the intent of wiping out that race. Those who use the term holocaust liberally to describe any death seek to trivialise true evil. In doing so they become apologists for evil. And yes folks like David Ward MP, Baroness Tongue and others I am talki9ng about you.
In not forgetting
