Riding in Carz with Boyz: Holocaust: Burning of Men on the Alter of Evil

Coming back from Christmas break I've found myself engrossed, along with several 7th grade students, in a book called "Night" by Elie Wiesel. It is by far one of the most profoundly terrifying and deeply moving memoirs on the face of this planet. It takes you on a, way-too-real, roller coaster ride straight into the pits of hell that can only dwell inside the hearts of evil men; a tale that enables sadness to sink bone deep. I must confess that I initially felt myself shy away from this task, as I can hardly bare to even think about the Holocaust. It steals my breath, my sanity. There are no words, no thoughts, no reasoning.

More times than I can count, I had to put the book down and weep, bitterly. There are no words. Simply no words. Not only does the merciless and callous torture utilized penetrate my heart like a crazed murderer on the rampage for blood, but the immensity of the psychological warfare employed makes me feel as though I've been pounded to the ground by the unrelenting fists of hurricane force winds, narrowly escaping with my life. How could this happen? I found my soul crying out in anguish, HOW? Millions of questions shredded through my brain, with no answers to sedate the wild beasts of how? and why? that literally plagued me. They're are so many levels of evil that lie within this one word, holocaust, that no person can count nor comprehend.

Within, "Night", lies a complexity of heartache and horror. One of the most frightening recollections began right in the forward! I'd yet to reach the actually story and I was already paralyzed with the most awful thought man can have, God is not good. I choke on the sobs as I right this. Page 'xx' explains that young Elie was forced to watch the hanging of another child. Someone behind him groaned:

"For God's Sake, where is God?"

And from within me, I heard a voice answer, "Where He is? This is where --hanging here from this gallows."

And just a handful of sentences later, Elie wrestled with the following:

I no longer pleaded for anything. I was no longer able to lament. On the contrary, I felt very strong. I was the accuser, God the accused. My eyes had opened and I was alone, terribly alone in a world without God, without man. Without love or mercy.

Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, at the root of man's greatest fear is wrestling with the notion that God is not good. If He, the Creator of the Universe is not good, then what hope could any person possibly have? The most hopeless place I've stood in was a lie filled asylum that screamed God is not good. When I lost my baby brother, this gross injustice slapped me in the face till my cheeks bled. There was nothing bigger than the monster of hopelessness, and it stood in front of me at all times. To overcome this fear, was by far one of my greatest struggles. And years later when faced with the tragic killing of my husband's brother, I was brought back to that fear. I watched my big strong man fall to the ground, completely broken --crushed by the weight of unbelievable heartache. We had so many things already in common, I selfishly never wanted to share this with him. I had no words, nothing I said would bring his baby brother back nor would it ever make this great sadness cease. The only thing that I knew he needed to hear, to kill the monster that was weaving its destructive havoc-filled path was, "God is still good!" So I laid myself over this amazing man of mine, repeating over and over again, "God is still good, He is still good," as I sobbed with him.

How big is the enemy that convinces us that God is not good, that He is not here? Senseless violence and brutality is big enough. Hitler was that big. It's frightening how calculating Hitler was. To strip people of their identify, to wrap them tightly with an unrelenting fear, to uproot even the deepest of beliefs and convictions, to steal all hope, all dreams, and all passion; I cannot even fathom the thought process and even greater the confusion grows when I think about their [Hitler and his people] crazy ramblings becoming an active plan --carried out with great success. Even at my worst, I pray that I can never ever be convinced of doing such senseless acts, that our children can not be manipulated into ignoring human suffering and torture. I'd be lying if I said that these realities didn't scare me to death. Why? Because an entire country aligned themselves with insanity --how different are the people of today? I don't know!

I came to this wondering when in the book Elie recalls seeing girls flirting with the SS men. In the middle of this death camp, that playful flirting could exist is stomach wrenching. Have you seen the pictures of the slaves? Their living conditions? The death? The hunger? How can love grow in that place, how can attraction belong in those walls? How could these young men and women completely ignore what was right in front of their faces? Although a gross comparison, I found a small answer as I watched some children bullying another child. This is how! Make people believe the Jews were less than, the dirty, the infected, the stupid, the ugly, the smelly, the gross....... This is where blindness to human suffering, degradation, and segregation begins --dehumanizing people or a group of people. These thoughts shake me at my core --an exponentially shocking reality that grows like mold in a humid climate.

I went to my bible seeking truth, my spirit crying out for explanation; how could this happen when our God is good? How? I think I may have found an answer that gives the best explanation, a glimpse into the heavens:

2 Timothy 3:1-9

Don’t be naïve. There are difficult times ahead. As the end approaches, people are going to be self-absorbed, money-hungry, self-promoting, stuck-up, profane, contemptuous of parents, crude, coarse, dog-eat-dog, unbending, slanderers, impulsively wild, savage, cynical, treacherous, ruthless, bloated windbags, addicted to lust, and allergic to God. They’ll make a show of religion, but behind the scenes they’re animals. Stay clear of these people.

These are the kind of people who smooth-talk themselves into the homes of unstable and needy women and take advantage of them; women who, depressed by their sinfulness, take up with every new religious fad that calls itself “truth.” They get exploited every time and never really learn. These men are like those old Egyptian frauds Jannes and Jambres, who challenged Moses. They were rejects from the faith, twisted in their thinking, defying truth itself. But nothing will come of these latest impostors. Everyone will see through them, just as people saw through that Egyptian hoax.

Our thoughts and predictions become so erroneously consumed with the natural: earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, fires, ect.... However, the bible sends this warning, our greatest threat, is people! The human propensity towards evil is so great that it is what will mark the end of the world. Not natural disaster, man! This is how an entire race almost became extinct, because of the evil desires of man --not the desires of our good God.

Then comes the other stabbing question; why didn't God stop it? Why does bad things happen to good people? How can a creation of God, a reflection of His image, be so callously evil?

Free will!

But what does that mean and why would God let us have free will if we can be easily moved to commit such violent acts against one another. My next answer came while reading "Culture of Honor" by Danny Silk, where he quoted C.S. Lewis from his book "Mere Christianity":

God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go either wrong or right. Some people think they can imagine a creature which was free but had no possibility of going wrong; I cannot. If a thing is free to be good then it is also free to be bad. And free will is what has made evil possible. Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. A world of automata --of creatures that worked like machines-- would hardly be worth creating. The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily untied to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. And for that they must be free.

Of course God knew what would happen if they used their freedom the wrong way; apparently he thought it worth the risk.

I distinctly remember my first years in law enforcement how I pondered the thoughtless , senseless, compassionless decisions of some people --it was maddening. How was I ever going to effect a change, if I had no clue where to start? Thankfully I was given an answer to calm the storm to a dull roar. Early in my career, my mentor Dick Powell, said this very wise statement to me: "Melissa you will never be able to figure out the whys, ever. You will never be able to think the way that 'they' do -and that's a good thing." My heart for the oppressed doesn't hurt any less, but I came to the conclusion that their are some things that I will never be able to understand.

It comes down to simple choices, it is all about our choices. Will you choose to be good or to be bad? Evil is a possibility for all of us, that one thing is clear. However, greater are our the rewards of love. He thought we were worth the risk, let's show that we are! Isn't love the clear choice; the simplest yet joy-filled answer. Limitless in it's propensity for goodness --love is the answer to end human suffering and injustice. And know, that you have to participate in one or the other ---the silent observer subconsciously chooses evil. Will you be the advocate or the torturer?

!!Caution!! Graphic pictures below