Churches Together in Britain and Ireland

Churches Together in Britain and Ireland

inter-religious - archive

holocaust memorial day

 

27 January 2015
Holocaust Memorial Day: Keep the Memory Alive 

As well as Holocaust Memorial Day, this date also marks the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and death camp, and the 20th anniversary of the Genocide in Srebrenica.

News

December 2014

70 candles for 70 years - interactive map of candle locations
Holocaust Memorial Day events will host one of 70 specially designed candles commissioned to mark the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. The candles will symbolically link commemorations taking place across the UK. You can find your nearest event using an online interactive map.
Holocaust Memorial Day link to external website

 

November 2014

Stephen Fry and British artists launch Memory Makers project
Stephen Fry joined British artists and Holocaust and genocide survivors to launch a new arts project in which survivors' stories will be explored through writing, poetry, ceramics, film, illustration and collage.
The Memory Makers project link to external website

Resources

The resources below are created jointly by the Council of Christians and Jews, and Churches Together in Britain and Ireland (CTBI), for Christian churches. They are intended to offer a range of materials in which to explore the theme of Keep the Memory Alive; what remembrance is; how to deal with enmity and achieve true reconciliation, ecumenically, between Jews and Christians, and in wider interfaith relations.
 

Holocaust Memorial Day 2015Holocaust Memorial Day 2015 resource pack (from CCJ) link to external website

Background to Holocaust Memorial Day

One of the most painful realities for European Christians to deal with is the past complicity of many Christians and churches in the Nazis' attempt to exterminate the Jewish people. A long history of Christian anti-Semitism that fed into numerous persecutions of the Jews, up to and including the Holocaust/Shoah, has also been acknowledged.

Christians and churches can engage with the issues relating to the Nazis Holocaust, and relations with the Jewish community, in numerous ways.

The Roman Catholic Church addresses Jewish-Christian Relations through the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. The Commission of the Holy See for Religious Relations with the Jews link to external website has important documents that are invaluable resources.

The Council of Christians and Jews, the Centre for Jewish-Christian Relations in Cambridge and the Beth Shalom Centre link to external website all provide resources and opportunities for further study and reflection.

In 2002, the United Kingdom Government set up Holocaust Memorial Day (27th January each year) which remembers the suffering of the Holocaust/Shoah and other Holocausts (for example in Cambodia and Rwanda). The Holocaust Memorial Day Trust link to external website provides resources for the day itself, as well as general material. They also offer a regular email-based newsletter.

Holocaust Memorial Day 2015

© Churches Together in Britain and Ireland - see website for details - www.ctbi.org.uk