Until We Meet Again

The history of this planet we call home is riddled with many highs and many lows. I believe we can all agree that 2020 has been a low year in more ways than one. Something I've realized during these troubling times is how distant and removed the crisis around us can feel when we aren't experiencing it or being impacted by it first-hand. I had a similar revelation when reading "Until We Meet Again: A True Story of Love and Survival in The Holocaust".

We are taught about the Holocaust in school (which is more than we can say about the Tulsa Race Massacre, something I only recently learned about and I'm now 25) and the majority can agree that it was a devastating abomination and an extremely evil time in history (although there are some people who really don't believe it happened, which is unsettling to say the least). Even though we have the knowledge of what happened to the Jewish people during World War II, it seems like is happened so long ago, and it can be hard to really understand the gravity of what happened and just how bad it was.

This book brought the tragedy and reality of the Holocaust to life in my heart and mind like never before. Maybe it's the real-life romance of these two suffering Jews, or maybe it's how close to home their story is to me. The Jewish couple in this book settled in the town right next to mine (Ponca City, OK) after World War II. When I realized how close two people who lived through the Holocaust were to my own life in Tonkawa, OK, it really made me think about the realness of the Holocaust. It wasn't just some far off event; it's an event that shook the world.

I have to admit, when my husband told me I needed to read this book I was hesitant. I knew it was going to be really intense and provoke me to feel some really deep things, and I wasn't really wanting that at the time. Yet, I relented, and I read it. And I'm so glad that I did. Not only is it an amazing book, extremely well-written, engaging, and it reads like a novel, but it truly does portray the evilness of anti-semitism. How could a people be hated so much that the goal was to bring them to extinction? Sadly, this is the story of the Jews from centuries past. They have historically been a hated people, and it draws me to beg the question: why?

Maybe there is no specific reason. Maybe, like black people, they are hated by some simply because they are different. They are thought of as less-than just because the color of their skin is different, or maybe because their culture doesn't make sense to us. The fact of the matter is that there are no reasons ever that would make hostility and hate toward a people group right or acceptable. I think that everything going on with the Black Lives Matter Movement right now is what brought this book back to my mind. It's been a couple of years since I read it, but my heart has been heavy with the disgraces and injustices happening to the black community right now, and it made me think about this book and how other people groups have dealt with hostility and hatred for no reason at all as well.

There is one similarity that is strikingly true and urgent; those of us who are privileged must speak up for those who are being persecuted and hated. The people living in the towns where concentration camps were located knew what was going on, but did nothing, except for those good people who helped the Jews hide, risking their lives for the sake of protecting someone else's. We need more people like that right now who are willing to stand up and speak out for what is right. Who help those in need, offering not mere words, but take action.

I believe this is a book that should be read by everyone. We need to be reminded of all that has happened in our history. We need to learn about the suffering of others, so that we can be a better help to them. This book in particular isn't an easy find, but I have found it on a couple of sites (links below). I hope that if you (the reader of this article) decide to purchase the book and read it that you will be filled with compassion, empathy, and understanding for the suffering of others and that it would draw you to action.