Yom Ha’Shoah

Yesterday we commemorated Yom Ha’Shoah at Luther. It was a particularly profound moment, because Gary Simpson and John Matthews (requires windows media player) had worked together to create a powerful litany and ritual of candle lighting. We don’t engage this memory as often as we should. I was thinking about other ways to do so, ways that might engage the imagination of my children, too, when Jane Redmont sent me this link to a story about a group of Jewish educators who have found ways to help children connect with children who were killed in the Shoah. These children have found creative ways to remember, one on one, these other children whose lives were cut short so brutally. In the Christian community we do not have bar or bat mitzvah as an occasion to weave such memories, but surely we could use the deepening of faith and leadership that is attended to during confirmation as a moment to evoke such a practice?