Interfaith leaders commemorate Yom Hashoah
Los Angeles
April 10, 2013
by Evan Henerson, Contributing Writer
In what was anything but a typical Yom HaShoah assemblage, more than 300 people — including two rabbis, a Methodist preacher, a Catholic priest and a U.S. congressman — packed into Temple Ramat Zion in Northridge on April 7 for an interdenominational observance titled “Remembering the Past, Securing the Future.”
The 90-minute event included recitations, songs from the Ramat Zion choir, and speeches by assorted religious leaders and political ambassadors. The common mantra of every remark: the importance of remembering the past to prevent an act like the Holocaust from ever happening again. Among those in attendance were Los Angeles City Councilmembers Mitch Englander and Dennis Zine and U.S. Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks).
During a yellow candle procession honoring those who lost their lives in the Holocaust, dignitaries carried signs with the numbers of Jews murdered at Nazi concentration camps. Bringing up the rear of the procession, the Rev. David Loftus of Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church — wearing a priest’s collar and a yarmulke — carried a sign recognizing “5 million non-Jews.” Behind Loftus, survivor Ruth Resnick bore a sign that proclaimed simply “Never again.”
“We are in a rare moment of time,” said Dana Erlich, Israeli consul for culture, media and public diplomacy in Los Angeles. “We are the last generation that will meet the survivors and be privileged to hear their stories firsthand, to be able to look into their eyes and to promise them, ‘We will not forget.’ ”
http://www.jewishjournal.com/los_angeles/article/interfaith_leaders_commemorate_yom_hashoah
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