Friday August 22, 2008

Brethren Heritage Tour

Thursday Afternoon – July 31

Featuring

Buchenwald Memorial

 We heard some sobering things during this trip – concerning persecution during the Reformation and Anabaptist movement – however, our visit to this concentration camp was beyond sobering.

 Visiting Buchenwald and reading how the 250,000 people who were imprisoned here were ruthlessly treated, affected me in ways I did not expect.  More than 50,000 died. 

 Foundations are about all that remain of most buildings.

  The camp was not a site of systematic genocide, but prisoners of war were killed on a mass scale, and many inmates died as a result of medical experiments or the cruelty of the SS. 

 The crematorium (building on the right) was the most difficult to visit, as it housed the furnaces and other reminders of the cruelty and experiments that were done here. 

I was thankful that the day ended with a pretty sunset – a reminder that God Almighty is still on His throne.