The Holocaust and the Resurrection

There's been a story in the news this week about a Catholic priest whom the Pope recently reinstated. Almost immediately after being reinstated, this priest made a public statement denying the holocaust. Catholics and Jews around the world are protesting the Pope's decision and calling for action. As I was listening to recent updates on NPR yesterday I was astonished to hear how many holocaust-deniers there are in the US and in the world. Something as recent and well documented as the holocaust leaves little (or no) room for doubt in my mind. How is it that so many actually deny it?

There's a certain parallel here with the resurrection and with belief in general. What is the cause of unbelief? Is it a lack of evidence? Many say that if God showed himself to them, in a way that they could see and experience, then they would believe. This was a common thing that we heard in China. But is it true? How many would actually believe in God if they saw him?

The holocaust took place about 60 years ago. There are innumerable photographs and even video footage of the concentration camps. We have testimony after testimony of guards who worked in concentration camps, describing the horrors that occurred there. We have the eyewitness testimonies of soldiers, some of whom are still alive, who walked through the concentration camps and saw the famished captives there. And finally, we have the testimony of prisoners who were released and lived to tell about their experiences, some of whom are also still alive. Is there any lack of evidence that the holocaust occurred? Absolutely not. The issue of people denying the holocaust has nothing whatsoever to do with evidence. What we see, rather, is the ability of the human heart to twist any amount of evidence in order to serve its ends, its preconceived beliefs.

When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead (Jn 11), there was a division among the people. Some believed. Some, however, did not believe, but went and reported what Jesus did to the Pharisees. They believed, in a sense, in what Jesus had done. But they did not believe in Him. They wanted him dead, that's why they told the Pharisees. The issue was not one of evidence, but of the heart.

The next time I have a conversation with someone who doesn't believe in Christ because of a lack of evidence, I'm going to ask them what they think about those why deny the holocaust. I think that the comparison is striking.