journey through forgiveness...

so, during the past year, i've been studying the concept of forgiveness, what it means, what it looks like, and the different interplay that affect and effect how it could be expressed. As i was reading through some of the books and discussing this with my tutor (karryn), it became apparent that maybe understanding evil might be helpful...and so i read some more...and thought some more...so, here's some visual on my journey on some examples of evil perpetrated by humans through concentration camps from terezin, czech republic, to auschwitz, poland...

This is the cemetery just outside of the gates of the camp. Terezin was initially a fort already created to defend the city during the earlier centuries...so inside is actually a structure already fitted with a moat and tunnels, so the Germans did not have much difficulty in acquiring a building. Most of the people here were from the czechoslovaskia. This camp was initially a holding camp, where some prisoners were political enemies and/or local criminals. The man who assasinated Franz Ferdinand was actually incarcerated here. The docent made a point that if the political tides were different, the assasin might be a patriotic hero as opposed to a prisoner...a provocative thought...this speaks a bit of how complex issues can be...who's right is being violated and who's justice is being pursued...but in the midst of all this political strife, racism and evil ensued that many, mostly innocent, perished.

"work will set you free"
this was written on the entry way as prisoners go through this passage...ironically, many of them tasted not the kind of freedom that they were hoping for.

prison cell of Franz Ferdinand's assasin

This facility was never used. This was created because the Red Cross was coming to visit. There was also a propaganda video made to show that the Jews favored being in the camps because they 'enjoyed' living together and showed them playing sports and laughing...yet again, one can't just argue that this overt manipulation of truth is merely a result of brainwashing...there was full knowledge of what was being done...which makes it worse

same sign posted in Auschwitz entrance...


guard towers lined throughout acres of fields.

barracks for prisoners to be housed in. each one can contain up to hundreds of people, and some more...because people were emaciated, many had gastronomic problems and, well, sickness passed on to each other.

Dr Mengele was assigned here and experimented on children, mostly twins, and many Gypsies. He wanted to find out how the human body functioned and how to manipulate genes...interestingly, he's studying subjects that he considered to be subhumans....this pic is that of one of the ovens where people were cremated...it was destroyed before the allies got there, but many of the artifacts left identified it as one of the cremation ovens. Mengele was never found and was thought to have hidden in Argentina.

There have been questions of whether true evil exist. a professor in canada even denies that this holocaust ever existed. one has to ask, if we can't name something evil and call it as is, then what grounds do we have in calling anything. the reality of the act perpetrated critiques how we define it...and multiple experiences of different and the same experience can also enhance our understanding of what evil can be. the problem is we often deny the reality of the situation, and most often due to our refusal to take responsibility for them. have we created such idols of ourselves that we can't even recognize our own fallibility and restrain ourselves from calling things as is because we refuse to acknowledge the more truthful reality of the situation?
i often think of what Wendell Berry spoke about in "The Hidden Wound" that humans have a distorted relationship with each other and nature...that maybe Adam's refusal to take responsibility for his complicit disobedience also speaks of our arrogance and self idolatry...that we esteem and worship ourselves on others cost.

this memorial was placed not long after the camp was closed down. Miroslav Volf's book on Exclusion and Embrace spoke about the necessity to remembering rightly that we may also forgive rightly. Memory, even if our interpretation might differ (which does not necessarily dismiss the truthfulness of the situation, but might even in situations, enhance them) is crucial in how we can forgive and reengage with a renewed relationship, and hopefully avoid the same evil again. Yet, as my train was leaving auschwitz, there were taggings along the wall, and one of them had the star of David on a noose. Did we not remember correctly, or are we just getting to taste of how insipid and evil evil can be?