HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL DAY at 12 noon on Friday 27 JANUARY 2023

There will be three parts to the day.

First, at 12 noon on Friday 27th January at the Cenotaph in Regents Circus there will be a short (20-minute) ceremony, including talk and wreath-laying.

Next, at 12.30 pm the same day, Friday 27th January, at the Friends Meeting House, Eastcott Hill, there will be a gathering for readings and reflection. Light lunchtime refreshments, including sandwiches and hot drinks are provided. This gathering is expected to last an hour, with readings and presentations by members of many of Swindon’s faith groups and community groups, as well as contributions from individuals.

Finally, at 6.30pm in the Auditorium in the Sixth Form Centre at The Commonweal School, The Mall, SN1 4JE there will be a free showing of the award-winning documentary film Final Account made by the late Luke Holland, a former pupil of The Commonweal School. The film looks closely at the involvement of ‘ordinary people’ in the mid-European mid-twentieth century genocide. It comprises interviews with the last living generation of Hitler’s Third Reich and raises key questions about authority, conformity, obedience, national identity, and people’s roles in the decisions and directions taken by their own government, questions that may still be relevant today.

See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qobRIgAyQiY

NOTE. The theme for Holocaust Memorial Day this year is ORDINARY PEOPLE, which chiefly acknowledges two things. First, that genocide is facilitated by ordinary people, who may turn a blind eye, believe propaganda, and join murderous regimes. Second, that those who are persecuted, oppressed, and murdered in genocide are not persecuted because of crimes they’ve committed – but simply because they are ordinary people who belong to a particular group, class, or race of which others disapprove. Ordinary people still suffer such persecution today.

The aftermath of the Holocaust and of subsequent genocides continues to raise challenging questions for individuals, communities, and nations. H.M.D. 2023 asks people to think about what happens before and after genocide, war, and persecution, and of our own responsibilities in relation to such matters of life and death.