DAY OF THE RIGHTEOUS IN RZECZONIOW

On June 10th, 2011 students of the School Complex in Rzeczniów met with the Righteous Marianna Krasnodębska née Jarosz who was honored with the title “Righteous Among the Nations” by the Yad Vashem Institute for rescuing Jews.

Her visit became a lively lesson of history and was the final step of the project carried out by the students of the Rzeczniów school as part of the program “Polish Righteous – Recalling Forgotten History” of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews.

Students have been taking part in the program since March 2011. Their project was crowned by an official ceremony entitled “Commemorating the Righteous” and by the meeting with a witness of history: Marianna Krasnodębska . The Righteous Among the Nations shared her memory and knowledge with the students.

The Righteous told them about her friendship with Jewish children and about the help provided to their families. “I was raised in a spirit of patriotism, in Catholic faith. Our parents taught us how to symphatize with others, how to be sensitive to other people’s pain. Remember to always remain human” – said the Righteous at the end of her speech.

“It’s a warm, open and really nice woman. She was recalling the most difficult times of her life. She told us about her friends she managed to rescue and meet after the war” – commented the young people.

For the students of the School Complex in Rzeczniów the meeting with the Righteous Among the Nations was a unique opportunity to understand the times of the Holocaust and Nazi occupation in Poland.

From March to June 2011, as part of the program “Polish Righteous – Recalling Forgotten History” students familiarized themselves with Holocaust literature, watched documentaries devoted to Nazi crimes committed against the Jewish population and visited the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum.

The main goal of the program is to encourage students to gather information about people who rescued Jews during the Second World War and were honored with the title “Righteous Among the Nations”. Thanks to meetings with witnesses of history young people get the opportunity to understand the relations between the rescued and rescuers and the stories of rescue during the Nazi occupation in Poland.

More information on the website  of the Rev. Prof. Józef Pastuszka School Complex in Rzeczniów.