Just after U.S. churches showed solidarity with Israel by reading from the Torah on Sunday, August 13, German churches held their annual event, "Israel Sunday," in an effort to pay homage to Judaism. The story below reports that a branch of the church takes responsiblity for not speaking up during the Holocaust. A sidebar to the story: After the Second World War, the pastor of St. Mary's Church was Heinrich Gruber, a little-known righteous gentile who opposed Hitler, helped Jews escape, and testified at the Eichmann Trial after the war. He knew intimately the horrors of the Holocaust as he himself was sent to the concentration camps. He died in 1975.
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| Heinrich Gruber, Righteous Gentile |
Berlin’s Protestants celebrate roots in Judaism
SEPTEMBER 1, 2011
BERLIN
On Aug. 28, Marienkirche (St. Mary’s Church) in the heart of Berlin was one of many Protestant churches across Germany to celebrate Israel Sunday, with a service focusing on Christianity’s shared history with Judaism.
Lala Suesskind, chairperson of The Jewish Community of Berlin, an organization with more than 11,000 members, spoke at the service of the importance of forgiveness between Christians and Jews and the need for dialog to overcome prejudices among all faiths.
“Here in Germany, we should consolidate our existing relationships and unite,” said Suesskind. “Despite our differences, we all wish to come together in friendship, respect and recognition.”
Four years ago, Pastor Johannes Krug invited the first Jewish speaker to address the congregation at Marienkirche; it is now a regular annual event.
“Israel Sunday is rooted in the Middle Ages,” said Krug in an interview. It originally commemorated the destruction in A.D. 70 of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. “It has a very long history but the themes that we have focused on have changed over the centuries. After the Second World War and the Holocaust, more and more churches have used Israel Sunday to remember the Jewish roots of Christianity.”
About six million Jews were killed during the Nazi Holocaust in the 1930s and 40s.
Pastor Johanna Friese, who studied the Talmud in Israel, led the service for the first time this year. Friese said that the tradition promoting understanding between the two faiths on Israel Sunday has been gaining popularity in Germany in recent years.
In 1980, the Synod of the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland (in West Germany) adopted a policy of working toward renewal and regeneration of the relationship between Christians and Jews. The Synod acknowledged the Evangelical Church in Germany’s share of responsibility for the Holocaust, saying that there had been few instances of the Church speaking out against the persecution of the Jews.
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