INTERNATIONAL
FORGIVENESS DAY

 

Sunday, August 3, 2008

FORGIVENESS MASTERS WORKSHOP

 

Saturday, August 2, 2008

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2008 CELEBRATION LOCATIONS

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Eva Kor

CHILD VICTIM OF AUSCHWITZ MEDICAL EXPERIMENTS FORGIVES THE NAZIS AND WAR CRIMINAL DR. JOSEF MENGELE!

Children Used as Human Guinea Pigs

At the age of ten, twins Eva and Miriam Mozes, were taken to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp where the Nazi war criminal Dr. Josef Mengele used them for cruel and inhuman medical experiments. According to Eva, “Miriam and I were par of a group of children who were alive for one reason only – to be used as human guinea pigs. During our time in Auschiwitz, we talked very little. Starved for food and human kindness, it took every ounce of strength just to stay alive.” The experiments continued for nearly a year until Auschwitz was liberated in 1945. Both twins survived, but Miriam died in 1993 when she developed cancer of the bladder as a consequence of the experiments done to her as a child.

Eva, whose name is now Eva Kor, has since spoken explicitly about her experiences at Auschwitz and founded the C.A.N.D.L.E.S. Holocaust Museum in Indiana, where she now lives. On January 27, 1995, at the 50th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, Eva stood by the ruins of the gas chambers with her children – Dr. Alex Kor and Rina Kor – where she read and signed a document forgiving Dr. Mengele and the Nazi regime for what they had done to her. Eva says, “As I did that, I felt a burden of pain was lifted from me. I was no longer in the grip of pain and hate; I was finally free.”

Forgiveness as a Tool of Power

Ms. Kor confesses, “At first I was adamant that I could never forgive Dr. Mengele but then I realized I had the power now…the power to forgive. It was my right to use it. No one could take it away…It became a gift to myself as well, because I realized that I was NOT a hopeless, powerless victim.

“The day I forgave the Nazis, privately, I forgave my parents whom I hated all my life for not having saved me from Auschwitz. Children expect their parents to protect them, mine couldn’t. And then, I forgave myself for hating my parents.

“Forgiveness is really nothing more than an act of self-healing and self-empowerment. I call it a miricle medicine. It is free, it works and has no side effects.”

Champion of Forgiveness Award

Eva Kor was honored as a Hero of Forgiveness at the 12th annual International Forgiveness Day event on Sunday August 3, 2008. Heroes of Forgiveness are those people who exemplify the power of forgiveness by overcoming personal tragedies and traumas and moving from anger and revenge to the transformative release of forgiveness and reconciliation.