The Eyes of Auschwitz

When I went to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp, I visited Block 11, the building where St. Maximilian Mary Kolbe, OFM Conv., was martyred by the Nazis. Kolbe was only one of hundreds of thousands of people put to death; millions of Jewish people, as well as many others, including Christians, hundreds of whom were priests and members of religious communities of men and women, were murdered by the Nazis.

When I visited the second floor of Block 11, I saw, on a wall in a corridor, a row of hundreds of framed photographs--mug shots of men who had lived and died at Auschwitz. I took the time to study as many of their faces as time permitted me. It profoundly touched my soul to have that chance to look into the eyes of those men, now frozen in time.

I can't forget those eyes. They now torment me from my place of comfort.

Each of those sets of two eyes, so very much represent the eyes of millions of others. Those eyes stare out from saddened faces, and they continue today to stare at all of us. We don't have to visit Auschwitz to know that they are there, still there. Those eyes cry out not to be forgotten. I wonder how many people today stop for even a moment, wherever they may be, and take the time to notice those eyes, and those who might hold similar eyes today, and the real men and women who have held them?

At Auschwitz, I saw clearly inside of those eyes, and into the horror they beheld.

Those eyes of Auschwitz continue to stare at us all, and they continue to penetrate the souls of those who are willing to look into them.

How can we continue, in our own day, to pay tribute to the men and women who were put to death by the Nazis? Indeed, how can we recognize and acknowledge those in our own time, who in different places throughout the world, are put to death through genocide, and other types of violence, great and small? Do we even understand how such violence has been, and is, perpetrated by the potentates against those who are powerless?

Those eyes of Auschwitz, those millions of eyes there and beyond, continue to stare at us. Who among us cares enough to make sure the deaths of those who held them will never be forgotten?

Who are those people in our own lives, and in our own time and place, who might be "different" than us? Might we too, like those who championed the cause of the Nazis, or those who were complicit with them, fail to see such people as victims of those who know only how to hate?

Can we look into the eyes of such victims and recognize their true humanity, and can we acknowledge and recognize their dignity as fellow human beings?

What follows is a kind of poem I wrote as I reflected on my visit to Auschwitz and the second floor of Block 11. The poem is not finished . . .

The Eyes of Auschwitz

Still . .

Eyes

staring

wide opened,

focused clearly

Those eyes . .

staring

Portals

revealing souls

heart broken,

eyes staring

On the walls,

second floor

block 11

Auschwitz

Those eyes . .

staring

Eyes

on frozen faces,

young men

staring

Proud

eyes

staring,

staring

Those eyes . .

staring

Lineages

disrespected,

pedigrees

unaffected

Still today,

haunting

young men

staring

Those eyes . .

staring

Staring

through

generations

unknown

Eyes

staring still,

without end

staring

Those eyes . .

staring

Sorrow

pain

horror

death

Imprisoned,

focused

sad eyes

staring

Those eyes . .

staring

Tearless

crying eyes,

staring

staring

Those eyes . . .

staring

still.

 

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The Warsaw Ghetto

This marker showing the place of the wall separating the Warsaw Ghetto from the rest of the city, is located on a sidewalk along the side wall of the Conventual Franciscan Church of St. Francis of Assisi, Warsaw, Poland.  It is said that the friars smuggled food and goods into the Ghetto from inside the church. 

My visits to both the Auschwitz Concentration Camp, and to the site of the Warsaw Ghetto, have had a profound effect on my thinking about those places and the horrors that occurred there.  I will no doubt be reflecting on my thoughts from those places for a very long time to come.

During my visit to Warszava (Warsaw), Poland, I was able to go to the place where once was located the "Warsaw Ghetto", a place where nearly a half a million Jewish people were fenced in and imprisoned in their own city from 1940 until 1943. The living conditions in the ghetto were absolutely deplorable, and many thousands of innocent people died there from starvation, disease and violence. It's almost impossible to imagine how this could have happened in a "civilized" world. When the Nazis decided to clear out the ghetto and transport its remaining inhabitants to concentration camps, and to the fate of ultimate extermination in the gas chambers, many resisted. As the German soldiers went door to door rounding up the people, some cried out and begged to be left alone; they refused to be "voluntarily" taken from their homes and away from their families and loved ones. Many of those who resisted were "shot dead on the spot."

Real people; people who loved and cared for others; people who had dreams of better lives; people who wanted the best for their children; real people who were simply "shot dead on the spot."

The history of that place, and the horrible reality of what happened there, should never be forgotten.

My visit there has had a profound effect on me.

Like those who were so inhumanely treated in the Warsaw Ghetto, what human beings among us today might be considered to be so worthless and without rights that others who simply have "power" would have the right to "shoot them dead on the spot?"

These were my thoughts as I now contemplate my visit to the site of the Warsaw ghetto.

Friar Timothy

 

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Learn more about the Franciscan Church of St. Francis in Warsaw at the following link:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_St_Francis_in_Warsaw