Yom Hashoa, Holocaust Remembrance Day, gives us the opportunity to honor those who suffered during this horrific period of history. It challenges us to never forget the human potential for cruelty, genocide, and apathy. This day calls for us to pay attention and spend the time reflecting, learning, and coming together to respect the dead and support the living.

This year, our community has taken on a special project. It is a Jewish tradition to have a guard, shomer, sit with a person who has died before he or she is buried. That way, no one is left alone and they are given the respect of having someone present with them. The Jewish people who died in the Holocaust did not have the dignity of having a shomer, so our community will be acting as shomrim for the 24 hours of Yom Hashoa. People are taking one-hour shifts from Sun. April 23rd, 8:30 PM through Mon. April 24th, 8:00 PM. These people will sit in the sanctuary and guard 6 candles representing the 6 million Jews who died. They will read a list of names of the deceased, sit in silence, read about the Holocaust, and share reflections in a communal CBO journal.

We prefer to have 2 people taking shifts. If you know you would like to take a shift, please look at the drop down list for availability. At this point, we need more people to take day shifts and a couple of shifts in the middle of the night. We will start and end the guarding with minyan at 8:00 PM. If you cannot take a shift please join us for minyans and the speaker programs. 

Please contact Rabbi Bernstein (Rabbi.Bernstein@cbohr.org) or call the office (516-781-3072 to sign up or get more information.