Rabbi Mendy spoke of the importance of sharing stories with younger generations
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Gathered in a commissary room at Islington Town Hall are cross generation members of Islington Chabad. Rabbi Mendy Korer is leading the evening’s storytelling. As Mendy kindly prompts each speaker to takes his or her turn to share, the emotion in the room is palpable.
There’s a moving testimony from a man orphaned by the Holocaust, he’s here with his daughter, and granddaughter who’s dressed in school uniform. Three generations of one family, sat shoulder to shoulder sharing unspeakably sad memories.
The mantle of responsibility has always rested on the shoulders of the survivors; their painful memories the only living link to those lost. David’s grandmother, who for her whole life remained silent on the subject of the Holocaust, began to open up in her final years.
“Only 10% of our family survived, and it placed a horrible burden on my grandmother. She felt the guilt immensely. But I think she realised towards the end she needed to tell people. She knew it would be lost.”
Mendy speaks of his grandmother’s attempts to impart her testimony onto her grandchildren “Once upon a time there was a very bad man named Hitler.”
Notably absent from Islington Shabad, are witnesses to the Holocaust. The voices we hear are younger, and the stories told are second or third hand. Every year there are fewer survivors of the atrocities, the responsibility is now shifting from those that bore witness, to the second and third generations who must now pass on these enduring stories.
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HeadlineHolocaust Memorial Day: “We must take on the responsibility of remembrance”
Short HeadlineHolocaust Memorial Day: Generational storytelling
Standfirst
Gathered in a commissary room at Islington Town Hall are cross generation members of Islington Chabad. Rabbi Mendy Korer is leading the evening’s storytelling. As Mendy kindly prompts each speaker to takes his or her turn to share, the emotion in the room is palpable.
There’s a moving testimony from a man orphaned by the Holocaust, he’s here with his daughter, and granddaughter who’s dressed in school uniform. Three generations of one family, sat shoulder to shoulder sharing unspeakably sad memories.
The mantle of responsibility has always rested on the shoulders of the survivors; their painful memories the only living link to those lost. David’s grandmother, who for her whole life remained silent on the subject of the Holocaust, began to open up in her final years.
“Only 10% of our family survived, and it placed a horrible burden on my grandmother. She felt the guilt immensely. But I think she realised towards the end she needed to tell people. She knew it would be lost.”
Mendy speaks of his grandmother’s attempts to impart her testimony onto her grandchildren “Once upon a time there was a very bad man named Hitler.”
Notably absent from Islington Shabad, are witnesses to the Holocaust. The voices we hear are younger, and the stories told are second or third hand. Every year there are fewer survivors of the atrocities, the responsibility is now shifting from those that bore witness, to the second and third generations who must now pass on these enduring stories.
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