Although everyone who looks back on the events of the Holocaust would describe them as an unparalleled evil, I am guessing many are similar to me in that the sheer numbers of those exterminated by the Nazi powers seems hard to grasp. The Holocaust seems to be a distant atrocity crusaded by a few men with unspeakable darkness in their hearts. That is exactly why the preservation and displaying of these acts are so important. Genocide is not distant. In our world today, we have an axis of evil in the form of ISIS seeking to destroy all Christians and Yazidis living in their declared “Islamic Caliphate.” The memorials to the horrors of the Holocaust are so important in part of showing the depravity of man. Man is corrupt, separate from a holy God, and when left to his own devises, he is capable of unthinkable crimes.
One thing I believe the German memorials to the people whom their nation persecuted less than 75 years ago did well was making the Holocaust personal. The personal stories of individuals and families that suffered a brutality to cruel to put into words, make the death of each of the eleven million victims, a tragedy, not just a statistic too hard for one to wrap their minds around. Germany has done well to make sure the victims of the Holocaust are not some “statistic,” rather a tragedy that moves one to see the broken world around them.
However, it is easy to see that Germany is still immensely ashamed of their past. Although the Holocaust Museum in Berlin documents the story of the victims well, the museum itself is almost hidden. The monument of pillars outside could look to many like some attraction in Berlin, not a place of remembrance. Many visitors must have thought the same as they climbed over the pillars. The book burning memorial could hardly be noticed by an onlooker. From my visits to the museum and Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, I have noticed a torn Germany. One that wants to display its dark past to be a warning to the future, and another Germany that is shameful of its dark past and wants to put it away into a dark corner.
Still, the Holocaust Museum and the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp helped make an event I had read many times of in all my historic books less of a distant tragedy to a personal tragedy, as I stood in the place of victims with a name and a face. It helped me appreciate the service of my grandfather in World War 2 even more, and it pushed me to reflect on the state of man in our world today, remembering that genocide is still an evil that we must face today.