The silence that speaks volumes:

[superbeets]

[h=2]The silence that speaks volumes: Pope Francis stands under 'Arbeit Macht Frei' sign as he visits Auschwitz to reflect on the horrors committed at the Nazi death camp and 'let his tears flow' [/h]

Pope Francis paid a sombre visit to the Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau on Friday, becoming the third consecutive pontiff to make the pilgrimage to the place where Adolf Hitler's forces killed more than 1 million people, most of them Jews. Francis entered the camp on foot, walking slowly beneath the notorious gate at Auschwitz bearing the cynical words 'Arbeit Macht Frei', meaning 'Work sets you free'. He prayed silently for more than 15 minutes and let his tears flow before meeting with several survivors of the camp, greeting them one by one, shaking their hands and kissing them on the cheeks. He then carried a large white candle and placed it at the Death Wall, where prisoners were executed by firing squad. The wall is a reconstruction of the original - situated next to the Block 11 torture chamber - where Jewish inmates were forced to collect dead bodies. The pope wrote in the Auschwitz guest book: 'Lord, have pity on your people. Lord, forgive so much cruelty.'

 

[superbeets]

[h=1]The silence that speaks volumes: Pope Francis stands under 'Arbeit Macht Frei' sign as he visits Auschwitz to reflect on the horrors committed at the Nazi death camp and 'let his tears flow'[/h]

• Pope Francis has become the third consecutive pontiff to make the pilgrimage to Auschwitz in Poland
• Instead of making a speech he lead prayers to the 1.1 million mostly-Jewish victims murdered at the camp
• He also met 12 former inmates at the site which is now a memorial and museum
• Pope wrote in Auschwitz guest book: 'Lord, have pity on your people. Lord, forgive so much cruelty.'
• The pope then travelled to Birkenau, the main extermination site, to meet some 25 Christian Poles
• He was driven along tracks laid to allow trains of prisoners to be transported to the gas chambers and crematoria
• It is his third day of a five-day visit to Poland and he has devoted Friday to the theme of suffering

By SARAH DEAN FOR MAILONLINE and ASSOCIATED PRESS
PUBLISHED: 08:25, 29 July 2016 | UPDATED: 12:27, 29 July 2016

 

[superbeets]

Pope Francis paid a sombre visit to the Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau on Friday, becoming the third consecutive pontiff to make the pilgrimage to the place where Adolf Hitler's forces killed more than one million people, most of them Jews.
Wearing white robe and skullcap, Francis walked slowly beneath the notorious gate at Auschwitz bearing the cynical words 'Arbeit Macht Frei', meaning 'work sets you free'. He was then transported on a small car past barracks and brought to a spot in front, where he sat on a bench, his head bent for many long moments in contemplation and prayer.
The Argentine pontiff led prayers for the 1.1 million mostly-Jewish victims murdered at the camp and rather than making a speech he stood in silence to reflect on the horrors committed and let his tears flow.
He prayed silently for more than 15 minutes before meeting with several survivors of the camp, greeting them one by one, shaking their hands and kissing them on the cheeks. He then carried a large white candle and placed it at the Death Wall, where prisoners were executed.

 

[superbeets]

+37


Pope Francis walks through a gate with the words 'Arbeit macht frei' (Work sets you free) at the former Nazi German concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau in Oswiecim, Poland

+37


Wearing white robe and skullcap, Francis walked slowly beneath the notorious gate at Auschwitz bearing the cynical words

+37


The Argentine pontiff will not make a speech, instead he will stand in silence to reflect on the horrors committed and let his tears flow

• SHARE PICTURE

​

+37






+37




Pope Francis prays in the dark underground cell of St. Maximilian Kolbe. The Polish Catholic friar sacrificed his own life during the war to save the life of another man. The pope's visit falls on the 75th anniversary of the day Kolbe was sentenced to death

 

[superbeets]

The wall is a reconstruction of the original - situated next to the Block 11 torture chamber - where Jewish inmates were forced to collect dead bodies from after prisoners were executed by firing squad.
At the dark underground prison cell that once housed St. Maximilian Kolbe, a Polish Catholic friar who sacrificed his own life during the war to save the life of another man, Francis prayed again.
Kolbe was first captured by the Nazis and sent to prison for three months near the beginning of the war. When he was released he set up shelters for people fearing persecution and hid 2,000 Jews in his monastery.
He was then captured again, in 1941, after refusing to sign a document recognising him as a German citizen despite his German ancestry and for publishing anti-Nazi documents.
He never abandoned his priesthood and was subjected to severe violence and harassment. He became a martyr when he volunteered to take the place of a man with a family who had been picked to face death by starvation.
St. Maximilian Kolbe was killed on August, 14, 1941 and beatified by Pope Paul VI on October 17, 1971.
The visit falls on the 75th anniversary of the day Kolbe was sentenced to death by lethal injection.
A few shafts from a tiny window were the only light cast on the white figure of the pope, who knelt for many minutes before he crossed himself and rose to his feet.
After arriving Wednesday in Poland - the heartland of Nazi Germany's atrocities - the pontiff said the world had been plunged into a piecemeal third world war.

+37


Pope Francis is seen from behind passing the main entrance to the former Nazi German Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp

+37


Pope Francis prays at the Death Wall in the former Former Nazi German concentration camp. The wall, situated between Block 11 and 10, was the place where people were lined up and shot

• SHARE PICTURE

​

+37






+37




Pope Francis enters the dark underground prison cell at Auschwitz of a Catholic saint, Maximilian Kolbe. He also visited the gas chambers where thousands were killed

 

[superbeets]

+37


Pope Francis quietly reflected as he sat and prayed for 15 minutes in front of camp buildings at the former concentration camp

+37


The Argentinian pope is the first pope to visit who did not himself live himself through the brutality of World War II on Europe's soil

+37


Pope Francis was driven along tracks laid in 1944 to allow trains of prisoners to be transported right to the gas chambers and crematoria

• SHARE PICTURE

​

+37


Pope Francis walks towards the main entrance to Auschwitz in Oswiecim, Poland, on Friday. He has devoted the day to the theme of suffering

 

[superbeets]

He has repeatedly denounced those committing crimes in the name of religion, after Europe suffered a string of deadly jihadist attacks.
The pontiff, who has forged ever-closer ties between the Catholic Church and Jews since his election in 2013, met 12 former inmates at the site which is now a memorial and museum.
As the morning rain subsided and the sun began to shine, around 200 people gathered by a big screen in Birkenau to await his arrival, among them a group of elderly Poles known as the 'righteous among the nations' who risked their lives to help hide and protects Jews.
Francis met a group of survivors during his visit, shaking their hands, kissing them on the cheeks and stroking the heads of some of them.

+37


After leaving Auschwitz Pope Francis traveled the two miles (3 kilometers) to nearby Birkenau, a part of the deadly death complex where about a million of Europe's Jews were murdered in gas chambers

+37


On his visit to the concentration camp Auschwitz II the pope appeared emotional as he walked under the notorious sign

• SHARE PICTURE

​

+37


Poland's Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich welcomed the pontiff's intention to remain silent during his visit to the camp

 

[superbeets]

The meeting took place by the Auschwitz Death Wall, where inmates, chiefly Polish resistance fighters, were executed.
Some of the survivors made Francis offerings that were linked to their suffering. One offered a copy of a black-and-white picture, indicating he was in it.
Earlier, some of the inmates told The Associated Press they were excited about meeting the pope, a great authority to them.
'This is a huge thing for me,' said 100-year-old Alojzy Fros.
Among those who met the pope was a 101-year-old woman violinist called Helena Dunicz Niwinska who played in the Auschwitz orchestra as a prisoner, alongside others who worked at the camp hospital or who were there as children.
During the visit, prayers were said just a stone's throw from the ruins of one of the crematoriums which was blown up by the Nazis as they evacuated the camp.

+37


Thousands of prisoners were lined up for execution by firing squad at the 'death wall', also known as 'The Black Wall'. There are no bullet holes in the wall because this is a reconstruction which looks like the original

+37


Pope Francis lights a candle at the Death Wall in the former Former Nazi German concentration camp

• SHARE PICTURE

​

+37


The original 'death wall' was removed after Arthur Liebehenschel replaced Rudolf Hoess as the camp commander in November, 1943, and ordered the executions at the wall to stop

 

[superbeets]

+37


An aerial photo shows the pope lighting a candle in remembrance of the 1.1 million people who lost their lives at the camp

+37



Former Auschwitz concentration camp prisoner Naftali Fuerst (L) shows his camp picture to Pope Francis (R) in a yard next to the Death Wall

As he left the death camp, the Pope wrote in the Auschwitz guest book: 'Lord, have pity on your people. Lord, forgive so much cruelty.'
He wrote the words in Spanish, signing the message 'Franciscus'.
As an Argentine he is the first pope to visit who did not himself live himself through the brutality of World War II on Europe's soil.
Both of his predecessors had a personal historical connection to the site, with the first, John Paul II, coming from Poland and himself a witness to the unspeakable suffering inflicted on his nation during the German occupation.
His visit in 1979 made history and was part of the Vatican's historical efforts at reconciliation with Jews. Pope Benedict XVI, who visited in 2006, was a German who served in the Hitler Youth for a time as a teenager.
As a pope hailing from afar, Francis's visit helps to underline the universal importance of a site that in recent years has drawn ever more visitors from around the world.
Francis had been scheduled to fly from Krakow to Oswiecim, the small town where the former death camp is located, but due to bad weather traveled the 65 kilometers (40 miles) by car instead.
Poland's Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich welcomed the pontiff's intention to remain silent during his visit to the camp, saying 'often people go to Auschwitz... and they are silent (about the horrors) for the rest of their lives'.
'Instead, once we leave Birkenau we must spend the rest of our lives screaming, yelling and fighting all kinds of injustices,' he said on Thursday.

 

[superbeets]

[h=3]AUSCHWITZ: THE MOST NOTORIOUS OF THE NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMPS[/h]
Perhaps the most notorious of all the Nazi concentration camps, 1.1million Jews were killed at Auschwitz.
The camp consisted of three main parts: Auschwitz I (the base camp) Auschwitz II - Birkenau (the extermination camp) and Auschwitz III - Monowitz (the labour camp).
During the war, the camp was staffed by 6,500 to 7,000 members of the infamous SS - 15 per cent of whom were later convicted of war crimes.
It was run by camp commandant Rudolf Höss who was tried and hanged in 1947 for his part in the extermination.
The 'Arbeit Macht Frei' sign, meaning 'work sets you free', was inscribed on the gates of concentration camps to mislead prisoners into thinking the only way of securing their freedom was labour.

+37


A photo of prisoners taken during the reenactment of the Auschwitz camp liberation on the day after its liberation on 28 January 1945

+37


This picture of a group of children at Auschwitz was taken just after the liberation by the Soviet Army in January 1945

SS General Theodor Eicke, inspector of concentration camps, reportedly ordered the use of the slogan.
Some historians believe it has a less literal meaning and instead was intended as a declaration that self-sacrifice in the form of endless labour brings a kind of spiritual freedom.
For 1.1million people, Auschwitz meant death.
For many others, this dismal railway town in southern Poland was a horrific transit point on the way to being murdered somewhere else – in a labour camp or on a 'death march' to another prison-mortuary.

+37


A prisoners barracks is pictuered here in the former Nazi extermination camp Birkenau in KL Auschwitz-Birkenau

Among the many millions who met their death here were Poles, gypsies and Soviet prisoners of war.
Only 8,000 emaciated prisoners were still inside Auschwitz and its sub-camps when Stalin's forces arrived in January 1945.
The rest were already being herded across central Europe with just flimsy pyjamas and wooden clogs to protect them against the winter. Most were dead by the time Europe was liberated in May 1945.
The day the camp was liberated by the Red Army on January 27 1945 has subsequently been declared International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Following its liberation the camp has become a symbol of the holocaust and has operated as a museum since 1947.


The pope then travelled the two miles (three kilometres) to Birkenau, the main extermination site, and was driven along tracks laid in 1944 to allow trains of prisoners to be transported right to the gas chambers and crematoria.
Pope Francis met with some 25 Christian Poles who risked their lives to help Jews during World War II.
One by one, the elderly Poles shook the pope's hand, some kissing it. He handed a gift in a small red box to each one.
Among them was Maria Augustyn, whose family hid a Jewish couple behind a wardrobe for years, and Anna Bando, who helped rescue an orphan from the Warsaw ghetto and gave several Jews forged 'Aryan' papers.
The encounter at Birkenau was the first time a pope had met with a group of the so-called 'Righteous Among the Nations.'
Israel's Yad Vashem has recognized 6,620 Poles, more than from any other country, as 'Righteous.' That reflects the fact that Poland was home to the largest Jewish community in Europe before the Holocaust.

 

[superbeets]

+37


The pope was driven to the main extermination site alongside tracks laid in 1944 to allow trains of prisoners to be transported right to the gas chambers and crematoria

+37


Francis is seen here with the train tracks that led people to their death in the background at the death camp of Birkenau

+37


Pope Francis prays in front of the Memorial at the former Nazi Death Camp Auschwitz-Birkenau, in Oswiecim

• SHARE PICTURE

​

+37


The pope is pictured praying behind the remaining barbed wire at the camp. Francis's visit helps to underline the universal importance of a site that in recent years has drawn ever more visitors from around the world

 

[superbeets]

+37


The pontiff has forged ever-closer ties between the Catholic Church and Jews since his election in 2013

Very few of the 'Righteous' are still living. The survivors were typically teenagers or young adults who worked with their parents to help Jews.
Poland's chief rabbi has prayed a penitential psalm in the presence of Pope Francis at Birkenau.
Rabbi Michael Schudrich, originally from the United States, prayed Psalm 130 in Hebrew, which starts: 'From the depths I have cried out to you, O Lord.'
The prayer was then read in Polish by a priest.
During the prayers, Francis clasped his hands and bent his head before a memorial to the victims.
The audience included Auschwitz survivors wearing striped scarves evoking the garb prisoners were forced to wear, and Poles who had helped save Jews.
The Holocaust is an extremely delicate subject in Poland, where locals fuelled by anti-Semitism were accused of butchering Jews or delivering them to the Nazis.

+37


Pope Francis touches the head of a woman as he meets concentration camp survivors in the former Nazi German concentration camp

+37


Among those who met the pope was a 101-year-old woman violinist called Helena Dunicz Niwinska who played in the Auschwitz orchestra as a prisoner

+37


Francis also met survivors who worked at the camp hospital or who were there as children during the horrifying years

+37


Pope Francis enters block 11 in the former Nazi German concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau

+37


Pope Francis pauses to pray during the visit to the former German Nazi concentration and extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau

+37


The Holocaust is an extremely delicate subject in Poland, where locals fuelled by anti-Semitism were accused of butchering Jews or delivering them to the Nazis

+37


A sign reading 'Halt, Stop' with a skull and cross bones is seen at the former Nazi death camp

+37


Cardinals and bishops walk through the gate of the former Nazi German death camp of Auschwitz in Oswiecim

Those who did help sometimes paid the ultimate price.
A Hebrew prayer for the dead was read aloud in Polish by Stanislaw Ruszala, Catholic parish priest of the town of Markowa, where a family was wiped out after they were discovered to be sheltering Jews.
Jozef and Wiktoria Ulma and their seven children were butchered. Wiktoria, who was seven months pregnant at the time, had started giving birth before she was executed, according to the Vatican.
More than 100,000 non-Jewish Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war, homosexuals and anti-Nazi partisans also died at the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp in occupied Poland. The Soviet Red Army liberated it in 1945.
It is his third day of a five-day visit to Poland that includes meetings with young pilgrims taking part in World Youth Day, a global youth celebration.
Friday is devoted to the theme of suffering. Later in the day Francis will visit a children's hospital in Krakow and take part in a Way of the Cross with the young people.

 

[GasMan]

Pictures like this make me smile knowing Guesser stands by some senile Jew bitch who compares these photos to Donald Trump.

Im not not sure who the bigger idiot...the dumb fuck for making such a ridiculous comment or the idiot who can't admit she is an idiot for making this type of comparison and totally demeaning the horrors and atrocities she witnessed.

Going fishing with my Jewish friend till Sunday...hope you guys have a great weekend. I may call him a Jew bitch this weekend seeings how my anti-Semite feelings run so deep.

Guesser, you're a total whack job loser. Fuck you. Have a nice day.

 

[ScottL]

Pictures like this make me smile knowing Guesser stands by some senile Jew bitch who compares these photos to Donald Trump.

Im not not sure who the bigger idiot...the dumb fuck for making such a ridiculous comment or the idiot who can't admit she is an idiot for making this type of comparison and totally demeaning the horrors and atrocities she witnessed.

Going fishing with my Jewish friend till Sunday...hope you guys have a great weekend. I may call him a Jew bitch this weekend seeings how my anti-Semite feelings run so deep.

Guesser, you're a total whack job loser. Fuck you. Have a nice day.

Gasman, I was in here last night for a few minutes and noticed Guesser had made the last post in several threads. It was all the same repetition with the same motive, to antagonize. The posts were completely off topic and unnecessary as nothing new was said. I decided there was no point in responding to any of them.

Among Guesser's problems which are many is he doesn't know when to remain silent. But this is one thread in which you should have done so as well. There are plenty of threads in which to bash other posters. Not in a remembrance thread like this one. Sometimes it's best to remain silent like the pope. This horror unfortunately has to be allowed to quietly sink in once a year so it never happens again.

 

[busterhyman]

now if we can only get the leaders of the muslims -to do the same