Every year on Yom HaShoah, also known as the day of remembrance for the millions of lives lost during the Holocaust, Congregation Beth Shalom holds a special ceremony for the community to come together to reflect and pay their respects to the 6 million Holocaust victims.
This year attendees of the annual remembrance day had the opportunity to get a glimpse of the story of Corrie Ten Boom, a non-Jewish Dutch woman who, with the help of her family, saved approximately 800 Jews during the Holocaust by hiding them in their home.
Susan Sandager, who played Corrie in the theatrical play called “Corrie Remembers: The True Story of Corrie Ten Boom,” has performed at multiple Holocaust-related events at sites including the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., and venues in Israel including Yad Vashem.
During the May 5 performance, Sandager shared instances of Ten Boom’s real experiences of when the Holocaust began, background on her family, and what the experience was like witnessing harrowing historical events and how she remained resilient, offering kindness and generosity to those who needed it.
The intimate setting had the entire audience intently listening to the story filled with somber music, and historical images played on a projector. Some of the photos were of Corrie Ten Boom’s family, and images of the Swastika flag.
“I thought it was incredibly moving, and incredibly powerful. And a lesson on how we hope we would behave in a terrible situation,” Jonathan Krauss, executive vice president for the congregation, said in a followup phone interview. “Being Jewish, the Holocaust is a shared trauma that we always have to wrestle with, and we always have to think about, and [something] that we can never forget. Even though it was now 80 years ago, being able to be with my community, with other Jews, to experience a story like this is especially powerful.”
Ten Boom’s courage and heroism was something Krauss was especially moved by.
“She faced consequences for doing what she did. But she did it just because she believed that was the right thing to do. Not for any sort of reward, any kind of recognition, or anything like that. She put herself at tremendous personal risk, just because it was the right thing to do,” he said.
Ultimately Ten Boom and her family were arrested and imprisoned after a Dutch informant told the Nazis of the unlawful work they were doing at the time.
“I think it’s really important because it’s imperative that we never forget,” said Krauss. “Even though the Holocaust was 80 years ago, which seems like a long time, it wasn’t [and] in the grand scheme of things it’s imperative that people even today, Jews and non-Jew, be aware of the kinds of things that happened then so that we can avoid having anything close to that happen again.”
