The Last Day in Israel

On the last day of our pilgrimage we visited the Yad Vashem (Holocaust Memorial) and the Western Wall tunnels. 

The Yad Vashem was a very emotional experience. They have a children's memorial for the approximately 1.5 million children that were murdered in the Holocaust. It is a representation of the souls of all of these children and it was overpowering. As I walked through the cavern I thought of all of the children in my life and the sorrow I would have if this would happen to them. It was hard for me to leave this spot. On the grounds of the memorial they have trees planted for the Righteous. These are gentiles who risked their lives and the lives of their families to protect Jews during the Holocaust. There are 20,000 people recognized for this honor. It made me think about how history would have turned out if 2,000,000 neighbors, colleagues, and/or friends of these Jews would of had the faith and courage to act in such a heroic way. It really made me reflect on injustices that continue to occur to people in my life and what I can do on a personal level to help.

Thanks to Paul Kauffman's urging, our last tour for the trip was the Western Wall Tunnels. This is a massive archaeological project that provides a glimpse at the immense building skills of King Herod the Great. We saw the placement of stones weighing 100's of tons and stone carving so precise that it did not require mortar to build the wall as the stones fit together perfectly. Along the wall ran a road made of large stones. This would have been contemporary to Jesus' time and it was exciting to walk on the same stones that Jesus may have traveled.

We then traveled to Joppa (Yafo) for our last supper together. Fittingly it was in the upper room of a restaurant, but this room was on the shores of the Mediterranean with the lights of Tel Aviv flickering in the distance.  While we were traveling to Joppa the inauguration of Barak Obama as our 44th president occurred. Not only was their excitement in the US about the inauguration, but there was much interest in Israel. We listened to the inauguration speech on the radio (as it was being translated into Hebrew) and prayed for our new president. At the restaurant they had a TV playing with the inauguration festivities. When they started to play the Star Spangled Banner our entire group stood up and sang with pride and joy. Father Dan said that our guide and bus driver were blown away at our response as they knew that we were not all Obama supporters. However, in our hearts we strive to be One Nation under God, with Justice and Liberty for All.