Was God Present in Auschwitz? - Jackie Martinez

Entrance to Auschwitz I

I had been anticipating this day for months, the day where I'd stand on the same grounds where over 1.1 million people, 90% Jewish, were killed.  When I awoke this morning, I realized the day was here and to be honest, I had no idea what to expect anymore. As our group walked over to Auschwitz I, I figured that the dreary and cloudy weather would reflect the solemnity of our tour, and I was right. Everything I witnessed today was eye-opening. We learn about this tragedy in school 4000 miles away about 75 years later, but to be present on the camp's grounds gives one an entirely clearer perspective on the events that occurred here. Going through today's tour of Auschwitz I, I began to reflect on one of my questions I posed for myself in yesterday's post. However, instead of asking "Why would God let His people suffer this greatly?" I have amended it so as to ask, "Was God present in Auschwitz?"

Panorama Image of the Barracks in Auschwitz I

I've always believed that God is omnipresent and that no matter how much one may be struggling, He is still there beside that person guiding them through that struggle. However, today for the first time I questioned if God was actually there watching over His people as they were starved, tortured, killed, and most of all, dehumanized. There were many instances today when that question came up in my mind. It's hard to imagine how vast a number like 1.1 million is until it is put into perspective in some way. During our tour, our guide, Agnieszka, asked us approximately how many students go to Iona. Around 3000, we told her. With that number, she told us that all of Iona would have been placed in three barracks. That was a shock, as each barrack looked like it could hold at most 300 people. But 1000 people to one barrack? How easy it must have been for the prisoners' health to deteriorate in these conditions, in addition to the lack of sufficient food and excruciatingly excessive amounts of hard labor they had to endure. Furthermore, my question of God's presence at the camps came up again when we saw the clothes of the young children who were killed there. How could God have been present when these innocent children who did nothing wrong were killed? Finally and most importantly, was God present in the gas chamber? No one will ever know what happened in the thirty minutes it took for the Jews to suffocate and eventually die in the chamber due to the poisonous gas that stripped the room of all oxygen. To have been standing in the chamber today where hundreds were crammed in the darkness previously expecting to be receiving a shower after their several days of traveling without food or shower and now knowing that they were about to be killed had a profound impact on me. Here was when I truly began to reflect on God's presence at not just Auschwitz but all of Poland and on everyone who suffered during the Shoah. 


In the middle of the gas chamber today, there was a vase filled with white and red flowers and two candles on either side of the vase. Although I was saddened by everything I had seen, the vase filled me with a sense of hope and renewed my belief in God's presence everywhere. Yes, millions suffered and died during the Shoah but God's presence was active in those who never wavered in their belief in Him and those who performed acts that saved the lives of others, sometimes even at the cost of their own lives. For example, we saw the starvation cell in which Maximilian Kolbe stayed for 14 days until the guards finally killed him. He was a Catholic priest who sacrificed his own life in order to save the life of another. God was present in him. Although this did not take place in Auschwitz, we see God's presence in Lena and Alexander in the book, "The Holocaust Kingdom," when they say goodbye to their son, Wlodek, in order to secure his safety. For parents to have to sacrifice their own right to watch their children grow up in order for their child to have the basic right to grow up is God's presence within them. Mothers who went with their children to the gas chamber instead of abandoning their children to save themselves had God within them, thus making God present in the camps. Countless were lost, but think of how many more could have been lost had it not been for those who put the lives of others ahead of their own. It is in this way that God made Himself present in the camps and, through these acts of sacrifice, provided hope for those who were still surviving.