Holocaust Memorial Day 2021
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UK Commemorative Ceremony for HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL DAY 2021 Be the light in the darkness Broadcast online Wednesday 27 January 2021 As you gather, albeit in a virtual form, for the National Commemorative Ceremony for Holocaust Memorial Day, I would particularly like, as Patron, to offer each of you a warm and heartfelt welcome to this very special event. Holocaust Memorial Day occupies a vital place in our national life. It is, above all, an occasion to remember and honour all those who were so tragically and brutally lost in the Shoah – as I had the great privilege of doing at Yad Vashem in January last year – as well as all victims of more recent genocides. It allows us to reflect, together, on those desperately painful chapters of our shared history, and to reaffirm our collective determination that such unspeakable horrors must never be repeated. In the shadows of fear and ignorance, it is all too easy for prejudice to take root, and for persecution and violence to thrive. Darkness, unchallenged, can allow the malicious and the misguided to deny the past, to distort the present and so to destroy the future. This is why the theme of this year’s National Holocaust Memorial Day, “Be the light in the darkness”, is so important. It reminds us of the ultimate triumph of the light of knowledge and reason, of compassion and understanding, and, above all, of hope. It exhorts us to use the light within each of us to reveal wrongs, to expose falsehoods, and dispel hatred wherever encountered. In this task, we might have no better guide than the wise example of Rabbi Lord Sacks – so sadly taken from us last year – who spoke in such a deeply moving way at past Holocaust Memorial Day ceremonies, and who was an inspiration to people of all faiths and none. Through his exemplary life and his inspiring words he displayed a resplendent commitment to the task of resolving conflict between communities and world-views. Unafraid of confronting humanity’s failings, yet unshakeable in his belief in humanity’s potential, he displayed what seems to me the essential balance of [Type here goodwill and good sense that is necessary for goodness to prevail. May his light continue[Type here to shine and his memory live on as a blessing. 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Welcome OBE Woldman OBE to our first virtual ceremony. Chair of Trustees Chief Executive 2020 was extremely challenging, with loss Our hope today comes from the survivors of lives, jobs, ability to see friends & family of genocide who continue to share their life and all normality. The global pandemic has stories with courage. Each time they speak, also challenged the very essence of our own they re-live deep trauma. They do this to mission. We want everyone to learn from warn the world; to protect us, our children and genocide for a better future, but how does grandchildren from the horrors of genocide. one reflect on the past when the present is Our hope comes from our friends in the sector so overwhelming? In today’s divided world of who work hard for this vital cause. And our anxiety and misinformation, aren’t there more hope comes from you, the British public: our pressing matters to devote our attention to? heroic key workers, kind neighbours and ‘Our survivor generation has done what we In fact, it has never been more urgent than community volunteers who continue to be the now to remember where division, lies and lights in the darkness. can to teach the importance of continually fear can lead. The horrors of the Holocaust So even while physically apart, we still come and of subsequent genocides were facilitated remembering the victims of the Holocaust, together on HMD – to learn from genocide for when public vulnerabilities were exploited a better future.