"Their Lips To God's Ear — And Ours."
The scourge of hate
Less than a week before the infection of James von Brunn's anti-Semitism spread beyond his cybercircle of fellow haters, three pillars of human aspiration stood together at a former concentration camp and spoke of hope for us all. The shadow of Buchenwald, and the gift of memory, underscored the words of German Chancellor Andrea Merkel, President Barack Obama, and Buchenwald survivor and Nobel Peace Prize Winner Elie Wiesel. If their history-defying gathering was a triumph, the accompanying tragedy is that so many still refuse to hear them.
That tragedy played out, again, at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, when James von Brunn, an 88-year-old Holocaust denier and a white supremacist, entered the building and started shooting. He killed security guard Stephen Johns before he was shot and critically injured by other guards. Mr. Johns died; his assailant clings to life at a hospital.
All the medicine in the world will not cure what really ails James von Brunn.
Surgeons cannot treat hate, and from all known accounts hate coursed through James von Brunn, and finally found fatal force in a hallowed place meant for remembering the unimaginable costs of hate. Of course, he didn't believe the stories told in the Holocaust Museum. Now he has become one of those stories, a testimony to the very thing he denied.
But let us not dwell on one warped human being who killed, and wanted to kill more. Let us instead look at the greater danger, the hate that guided him, that guides so many, and what we can do about it.
Governments and nations may find ways to address the baser instincts that drive such hatred, but essentially the answer and the challenge to fighting it lies in each of us.
We must find the courage to find and raise our own voices against the cacophony of hate, and perhaps we can find inspiration in the messages from Buchenwald just last week.
Chancellor Merkel spoke of standing up for human rights and the rule of law, and fighting against terrorism, extremism and anti-Semitism.
President Obama spoke of rejecting the false comfort that the suffering of others is not our problem, and of the need to resist injustice, intolerance and indifference in whatever forms they take.
Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel spoke of respecting the "otherness" in people rather than hating it or them.
Their lips to God's ear — and ours.
Editor's comment: I couldn't have said it better myself if I tried.
Less than a week before the infection of James von Brunn's anti-Semitism spread beyond his cybercircle of fellow haters, three pillars of human aspiration stood together at a former concentration camp and spoke of hope for us all. The shadow of Buchenwald, and the gift of memory, underscored the words of German Chancellor Andrea Merkel, President Barack Obama, and Buchenwald survivor and Nobel Peace Prize Winner Elie Wiesel. If their history-defying gathering was a triumph, the accompanying tragedy is that so many still refuse to hear them.
That tragedy played out, again, at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, when James von Brunn, an 88-year-old Holocaust denier and a white supremacist, entered the building and started shooting. He killed security guard Stephen Johns before he was shot and critically injured by other guards. Mr. Johns died; his assailant clings to life at a hospital.
All the medicine in the world will not cure what really ails James von Brunn.
Surgeons cannot treat hate, and from all known accounts hate coursed through James von Brunn, and finally found fatal force in a hallowed place meant for remembering the unimaginable costs of hate. Of course, he didn't believe the stories told in the Holocaust Museum. Now he has become one of those stories, a testimony to the very thing he denied.
But let us not dwell on one warped human being who killed, and wanted to kill more. Let us instead look at the greater danger, the hate that guided him, that guides so many, and what we can do about it.
Governments and nations may find ways to address the baser instincts that drive such hatred, but essentially the answer and the challenge to fighting it lies in each of us.
We must find the courage to find and raise our own voices against the cacophony of hate, and perhaps we can find inspiration in the messages from Buchenwald just last week.
Chancellor Merkel spoke of standing up for human rights and the rule of law, and fighting against terrorism, extremism and anti-Semitism.
President Obama spoke of rejecting the false comfort that the suffering of others is not our problem, and of the need to resist injustice, intolerance and indifference in whatever forms they take.
Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel spoke of respecting the "otherness" in people rather than hating it or them.
Their lips to God's ear — and ours.
Editor's comment: I couldn't have said it better myself if I tried.
Labels: Crime, Punishment, Race, Racism
posted by KYJurisDoctor at 6:55 PM
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