Rabbis call for removal of church at Auschwitz

[webfact]

Rabbis call for removal of church at Auschwitz

 

Rabbi Jonathan Leener, Rabbi Ezra Seligsohn, Avi Weiss, Rabbi Shabbos Kestenbaum hold banners as they attend a protest to move a church situated next to Birkenau, former German Nazi death camp in Brzezinka near Oswiecim, Poland January 26, 2020. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

 

OSWIECIM, Poland (Reuters) - Four U.S. rabbis led by New York's Avi Weiss gathered on Sunday in front of a church next to the Nazi German death camp at Birkenau in Poland arguing for its removal from a site where more than a million Jews were murdered.

 

World leaders will gather on Monday at Birkenau and the nearby Auschwitz camp to mark the 75th anniversary of their liberation.

 

"This protest for us is very much part of the commemoration. For there to be a commemoration ceremony without an expression of deep, deep outrage that the church is still here would send a message that we're ok with this," Weiss said.

 

The rabbis argue the church should not be on the site of one of the largest Jewish cemeteries in the world and it violates a 1987 agreement between European cardinals and Jewish leaders that there will not be any permanent Catholic place of worship on the site of the Auschwitz or Birkenau camps.

 

"This (the church) in my mind is the greatest desecration of the history of the Holocaust," Weiss said.

 

"Beneath this ground is a cemetery ... their bloods are crying out from the ground demanding justice."

 

The rabbis want the church to be moved elsewhere in Oswiecim.

 

Weiss was making his first visit to the church since 1995, when at the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz he was arrested for orchestrating a sit-in in to protest against what he sees as attempts to portray it as a place mainly of Christian martyrdom.

 

On Sunday, as mass ended, the rabbis tried to enter the church and speak with some of the parishioners, as well as with the priest. The priest turned away from them. He did not want to speak with them and slammed the door.

 

Some parishioners raised their voices and expressed displeasure at the rabbis' presence but didn't want to speak to Reuters.

 

Weiss led a long and ultimately successful campaign in the 1980s to secure the removal of a Carmelite convent from outside the Auschwitz grounds. It had been set up in a building just outside the wire once used as a store for poison gas.

 

Jews were brought from all over Europe to Auschwitz-Birkenau to be murdered during the war as part of a Nazi genocide campaign in which six million perished. Tens of thousands of Catholic Poles, including priests and resistance fighters, were tortured and killed there too.

 

(Reporting by Joanna Plucinska; Additional reporting by Alan Charlish; Edditing by Giles Elgood)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-01-27

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[ezzra]

Had it been millions of Muslims perished there instead of Jews, would the Muslims of the world allow a church or a synagog to be built there? I don't think so...

[tifino]

why weren't they quicker? - to build a synagogue there first

[Moonlover]

34 minutes ago, webfact said:

Jews were brought from all over Europe to Auschwitz-Birkenau to be murdered during the war as part of a Nazi genocide campaign in which six million perished. Tens of thousands of Catholic Poles, including priests and resistance fighters, were tortured and killed there too.

Religious intolerance is probably the cause of more death and suffering than any other following on this planet.

 

These Rabbis would do well to remember that and be grateful that Christians are tolerant and understanding enough to worship and show remorse on their brethren's behalf.

[Chomper Higgot]

I personally agree the Catholic Church should not have a church at Auschwitz, the Catholic Church has blood on its hands from the Holocaust and it is offensive for the Catholic Church to have a Church at Auschwitz.

 

I don’t however agree there should be no Christian presence, Christians and others who were not Jews were also amongst the victims at Auschwitz, they too must be remembered.

 

I personally would like to see a pantheon, multi faith place of prayer and remembrance for all the victims of the Nazi death camps.

 

Again. I agree, get the Catholic Church out of there and let individual Catholics pray and remember alongside anyone who comes to pray and remember, regardless of their faith.

[bristolboy]

2 hours ago, ezzra said:

Had it been millions of Muslims perished there instead of Jews, would the Muslims of the world allow a church or a synagog to be built there? I don't think so...

In an article about Christians offending Jews, you manage to drag in the Muslims. Obsessed much?

[hansnl]

6 hours ago, tifino said:

why weren't they quicker? - to build a synagogue there first

That was tried several times, but never was allowed.

[Lacessit]

They have a point. Pope Pius XII during World War 2 studiously avoided any discussion of what was happening to Jews during the Holocaust, and local priests must have known what was happening in the death camps.

As usual, preservation of church property. The Pope did not want to offend Mussolini and Hitler.

[Traubert]

Can't they just have a multi-faith facility and respect each others losses?

 

I suppose that's too much to ask.

[bristolboy]

6 hours ago, Moonlover said:

These Rabbis would do well to remember that and be grateful that Christians are tolerant and understanding enough to worship and show remorse on their brethren's behalf.

Are you referring to the parishioners of the church at Auschwitz? Any evidence that this congregation is showing remorse on their brethren's behalf?

[jaiyen]

6 hours ago, Moonlover said:

Religious intolerance is probably the cause of more death and suffering than any other following on this planet.

 

These Rabbis would do well to remember that and be grateful that Christians are tolerant and understanding enough to worship and show remorse on their brethren's behalf.

A bunch of rich American Rabbis who love the publicity ! They have forgot that it was Christians who fought to end the war and rescued thousand of Jews from the camps and then nursed them back to health, where possible and re settled them in various countries.  I knew a few people who were in the camps and thought they never talk about it, they did say they were grateful for what the Allied Forces did to rescue them and help them afterwards for many years.   

[bristolboy]

2 minutes ago, jaiyen said:

A bunch of rich American Rabbis who love the publicity ! They have forgot that it was Christians who fought to end the war and rescued thousand of Jews from the camps and then nursed them back to health, where possible and re settled them in various countries.  I knew a few people who were in the camps and thought they never talk about it, they did say they were grateful for what the Allied Forces did to rescue them and help them afterwards for many years.   

And you know that these rabbis are rich how? You've betrayed your anti-semitism.

And if you're going to credit Christians for the rescue of Jews, then who do you blame for their slaughter. In fact, the armies that rescued that small percentage of surviving Jews came as soldiers of their nations not as soldiers of any particular religion. Or are you confusing WW2 with the Crusades?

[Traubert]

Ah. It wasn't going to be long until the anti-semitism card came out was it?

[jany123]

8 hours ago, ezzra said:

Had it been millions of Muslims perished there instead of Jews, would the Muslims of the world allow a church or a synagog to be built there? I don't think so...

How about you walk us thru a scenario in which Muslims of the world force a 93% catholic nation, with virtually no Muslim citizens,  into not erecting a Catholic Church.... giving special consideration to the fact that the Catholics have a saint martyred there

[Scot123]

1 hour ago, bristolboy said:

And you know that these rabbis are rich how? You've betrayed your anti-semitism.

And if you're going to credit Christians for the rescue of Jews, then who do you blame for their slaughter. In fact, the armies that rescued that small percentage of surviving Jews came as soldiers of their nations not as soldiers of any particular religion. Or are you confusing WW2 with the Crusades?

What utter dribble. Try reading some history as nazi's were atheists by design. If you wish to question the wealth of these men just look it up first. If survivors had made issue over this then it would hold some credence. Let us not forget that there were many groups who lost people: civilians who list their lives and the military who died defeating these maniac Nazi and let's not forget the Japanese who also masacared millions of civilians (mostly Chinese). More than just Jews died at the hands of evil. 

[bristolboy]

1 hour ago, Traubert said:

Ah. It wasn't going to be long until the anti-semitism card came out was it?

Simplistic thinking much? I called jaiyen out on this because he described these rabbis as rich? Was there anything in the article that discussed these rabbis economic status? And what is a common belief among anti-semites? That all Jews are rich. So, no, I don't think it was a stretch or a reflexive response.

Edited January 27, 2020 by bristolboy

[TheFishman1]

Move the Church 

[jany123]

2 hours ago, Scot123 said:

What utter dribble. Try reading some history as nazi's were atheists by design. 

Yes, right... so I took your advise and tried reading some history... and found that Germans leading up too, and including the war, were as much as 95% Christian by survey (mainly Protestant... so bristolboy was 100% correct... the soldiers identified as Christian, even if the political party in power, did not.

[URMySunshine]

It would have probably been better not to open this thread to comments as some things are best left unsaid and a holocaust memorial ding dong is an extremely unedifying thing to have on an internet forum whatever the merits of an 'argument'. Let the dead rest in peace and we should never forget what terrible unconscionable acts of utter inhumanity happened there and done by man unto man on an industrial scale.

[Dumbastheycome]

4 hours ago, bristolboy said:

And you know that these rabbis are rich how? You've betrayed your anti-semitism.

And if you're going to credit Christians for the rescue of Jews, then who do you blame for their slaughter. In fact, the armies that rescued that small percentage of surviving Jews came as soldiers of their nations not as soldiers of any particular religion. Or are you confusing WW2 with the Crusades?

It should  not be ignored or distracted from that the battle and outcome of WW2 was not based on religious ideology. The outcome culminated in liberating Jewish survivors among significant numbers of  others as a laudable  consequence but  not the primary objective.

I make  no apology for the fact that I do not feel greater objection of gross attempted  genocide to a specific group of people than I do for the collective others who suffered same fate in equivalent numbers !

If there were to be any singular memorial to ALL those who so horribly perished it should be  represented in a form that denies allegiance to any specific religion but recognizes the diversity of the entirety of the victims !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BangkokBaksida]

12 hours ago, Chomper Higgot said:

I personally agree the Catholic Church should not have a church at Auschwitz, the Catholic Church has blood on its hands from the Holocaust and it is offensive for the Catholic Church to have a Church at Auschwitz.

 

I don’t however agree there should be no Christian presence, Christians and others who were not Jews were also amongst the victims at Auschwitz, they too must be remembered.

 

I personally would like to see a pantheon, multi faith place of prayer and remembrance for all the victims of the Nazi death camps.

 

Again. I agree, get the Catholic Church out of there and let individual Catholics pray and remember alongside anyone who comes to pray and remember, regardless of their faith.

You are aware that Poland is a sovereign nation - and a predominantly Christian one at that, right?

[bannork]

A picture of Anne Frank on the right in front of the first high-rise in Europe, De Wolkenkrabber in Amsterdam, built in 1930.

[bristolboy]

4 hours ago, Scot123 said:

What utter dribble. Try reading some history as nazi's were atheists by design. If you wish to question the wealth of these men just look it up first. If survivors had made issue over this then it would hold some credence. Let us not forget that there were many groups who lost people: civilians who list their lives and the military who died defeating these maniac Nazi and let's not forget the Japanese who also masacared millions of civilians (mostly Chinese). More than just Jews died at the hands of evil. 

The historian Richard J Evans wrote that, by 1939, 95% of Germans still called themselves either Protestant or Catholic, while 3.5% identified as "gottgläubig" (lit. "believers in god", a non-denominational nazified outlook on god beliefs, often described as predominately based on creationist and deistic views^[7]) and 1.5% atheist... The majority of the three million Nazi Party members continued to pay their church taxes and register as either Roman Catholic or Protestants.^[31]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_Nazi_Germany

[CharlieH]

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[jak2002003]

8 hours ago, Traubert said:

Can't they just have a multi-faith facility and respect each others losses?

 

I suppose that's too much to ask.

Because most religions people are brainwashed to think of other faiths as the enemy.. and working against their god or gods, because apparently each religion knows for sure that they are the only true one and everyone else must convert to them or go to hell for eternity being whipped and burnt by little red demons.  

 

Sad, how in this day and age, with our supposed intelligence, many humans have such backward and stupid thinking to believe in religions at all.  

[stevenl]

12 hours ago, bannork said:

A picture of Anne Frank on the right in front of the first high-rise in Europe, De Wolkenkrabber in Amsterdam, built in 1930.

Off topic, but not the first high rise in Europe. Het Witte Huis in Rotterdam was the first in the Netherlands.

[Lacessit]

On 1/27/2020 at 11:31 PM, jak2002003 said:

 

 

Sad, how in this day and age, with our supposed intelligence, many humans have such backward and stupid thinking to believe in religions at all.  

Right on.

 

“You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, burning bushes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?" –Mark Twain

 

 

[evadgib]

Of peripheral interest to this board published yesterday: