Ray Comfort's Blog, page 36

The old radio

It was January 20, 1944, as Jerry sat in his room back in Paris, he felt a deep sense of satisfaction for the role he played in finding key German installations. He reached out and fine-tuned an old radio as he listened to the BBC. It cracked:

"The RAF dropped 2,300 tons of bombs over Berlin today, just one week after a massive array of 1,400 American planes darkened the central German skies, unloading a barrage of bombs that obliterated three key Nazi aircraft assembly plants. Despite the loss of 59 heavy bombers and five fighter jets, the United States Eighth Air Force called its assault a 'major military success' and German dispatches even acknowledged that 'the enemy (was) technically superior.' The three plants that were hit were Oschersieben, Halberstadt and Brunswick, all-important factories of war for the Third Reich. Virtually all available planes in the Luftwaffe arsenal, (about 100) were used in defense. Of those, 28 were downed by American fighters."For Evangelism Resources, please visit LivingWaters.com.

Crock-O-Duck!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9eAJ8rfzvk


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Jeremiah

He looked up from the Book and with tears streaming down his cheeks said,

"My dear, our light has turned to gross darkness . . . but our God is rich in mercy to all that call upon Him. He will judge Germany, and once again cause His face to shine upon us. One day Messiah will come and restore all things. The God of our father's will draw us back to Jerusalem. He who scattered Israel will gather Him."

His naiveté angered her. Rachel glared at him and said,

"I cannot accept your God. He is a tyrant!" He looked back and said,

"Hitler is the tyrant. Can't you see that you are doing what Israel did? You are creating your own god. Jeremiah has been labeled a 'prophet of doom,' but he was a prophet of good tidings. His very name means 'Jehovah will exalt.' God was willing, so willing to turn from His wrath and exalt His people by pouring His blessings on them, but they refused to turn from their rebellious ways. That was their choice. We, as a nation, had that same choice."

"What choice is this! We are starving to death. I have no money, no food, no family."

She glared at the old man and said,

"I cannot believe that God would just sit back and allow this to happen to 'His' people!"

Rabbi Cohen looked back at the Scriptures he had just read, and said,

"My dear . . . He has." That remark enraged her. As she stood to her feet, the Rabbi calmly said,

"But I have not seen the righteous forsaken, or his children begging bread . . . " With that she snapped,

"You stay here and die. I am going to beg for bread!" and stormed out of the room slamming the door.

Her anger seemed to energize her as she walked the streets of the ghetto looking for food. She was so angry at God and so desperate, she decided to sell her body to any man that would take her, but all she could find were widows and old, sickly men.

By this time she had become very weak with hunger. She returned to her section of the ghetto, and fainted on the sidewalk near where she had left more than seven hours earlier. No one came to her rescue. It was on the cold sidewalk that she recovered, and faintly whispered,

"Oh God of my fathers; the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Jehovah‑Jirah. Rabbi Cohen was right. I have sinned against You. I was going to sell my body. I am ashamed . . . I am so weak with hunger . . . help me . . . "

It was then that a shadow crossed her weary face and startled her. As she focused her eyes, to her horror she saw the tall figure of an SS officer. She cowered back in fear as he knelt down beside her. Then he opened her hand and to her disbelief, placed within it a roll of money. She was confused. Was he propositioning her? He then whispered,

"Don’t be afraid, and don’t be fooled by the uniform. My name is Jeremiah Adamson. I am an American working with the French Resistance. Please . . . I must find out where the German aircraft plants are in Berlin." Rachel listened to the tone of his voice and looked at his earnest expression. She looked at the soldiers waiting in the car, then inquiringly back at Jerry.

"They think I am an officer of the SS on special assignment for the Fuhrer, trying to uncover information about missing Norwegian children." Then he smiled slightly and said, "The Resistance can produce some fine German paperwork."

Again he said,

"Please . . . it is vital to the Allied cause. Why would I lie to you? All I need are the locations. You may keep all the money; buy yourself something to eat."

Rachel was stunned by what had just taken place. Seconds earlier she had prayed to the God of Israel to provide for her! She thought for a moment, lifted he weak body to her feet and said,

"Wait here," then disappeared around a corner.

Jerry walked back to the soldiers and said,

"I think I am onto something. The woman has seen two children that don't look like Jews . . . a little money goes a long way in making a Jew talk." They smiled then he wandered back to the sidewalk.

The Rabbi looked up in shock as Rachel thrust open the kitchen door. He had fallen asleep with the Bible still open at the Book of Jeremiah. When she left, her eyes were dull and flashed with anger, but now they sparkled with life as she said,

"The God of our fathers has not forsaken us! He heard my prayer!" and held the fistful of money up before his startled face. When she told him what had happened, he began to weep and said,

"My dear . . . God be praised. This is truly wonderful! I have the name of a man who could give this American all the information he needs. But how can I be sure this is not a trap? I could be signing this man's death warrant. What if this is a Nazi scheme to . . . "

Rachel held up her hand to stop his words and said,

"Rabbi, this man is from God. I forgot to tell you his name . . . it's Jeremiah."
To be continued.

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John MacArthur Makes Official Statement Regarding Jesse Johnson's Sermon 'The Way(s) of the Master'

As many of you know, Jesse Johnson recently devoted his entire Shepherd's Conference breakout session to issuing a critique of our "The Way of the Master" evangelism principles.  After Living Waters drafted its official response to the critique, Ray corresponded with Dr. John MacArthur about the matter, expressing, among many things, his concern that Jesse Johnson misrepresented Dr. MacArthur's official stance on the nature and function of The Ten Commandments.  In his response, Dr. MacArthur made it clear that he would have done what he could to alter Mr. Johnson's session, had he known the direction it was going to take ahead of time.  Dr. MacArthur subsequently sent Ray the following official statement for public posting:
For the record, we have no problem using the Ten Commandments as a mirror to show people their sin. We agree with Living Waters that the Decalogue is a summary of the moral content of God's law. The law's moral principles reflect the unchanging character of God, so they are eternal, universally applicable, and by definition unchanging. Given those facts, surely it is appropriate to use the Decalogue as Jesus and the apostle Paul often did – to confront sinners with their sin.
Furthermore, we're grateful for the way you have trained and encouraged so many people to do hands-on evangelism. You deserve a lot of credit for stirring the consciences of countless young believers and motivating them to share the gospel boldly. In no way would we ever want to discourage that.
We continue to believe that it is critically important for people training in the Living Waters method to 1) strengthen the gospel content of their presentation so as to be equal to the law, 2) see the law as not simply Ten Commandments, but much more as Scripture reveals, 3) To place particular emphasis on passages such as John 8:24 where Jesus says they would die in their sins for refusal to acknowledge Him. This is the greatest sin that goes beyond the Ten Commandments in its condemnation extending to every sinner.
I am grateful for your eagerness to enrich the people you train in these ways.  
Yours for the Master,
John MacArthur
We are grateful to Dr. MacArthur for graciously clarifying the matter.  Living Waters will remain deeply committed to continuing in our efforts of encouraging believers to fully and exhaustively exalt the glorious truths of the gospel, once they have presented the Law; highlighting the fact that it is appropriate to reiterate all sins mentioned in the New Testament, in the context of evangelism; and expounding the undeniable truth that refusal to believe in the name of the only begotten Son of God will lead to condemnation, being the ultimate sin of epic proportions—leading unbelievers to "die in [their] sins" because they are void of Christ as their propitiation. 
Living Waters

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"It is my food."

Rachel slowly opened the door of what used to be one of the many communal kitchens in the region of the ghetto. The wide‑open mouths of the cupboards told their own pathetic story. There was nothing but piles of rat droppings. The only reason she entered the kitchen was because of the flickering light of the candle on the table. She thought that someone may have found food and may give her some . . . anything to stop the unending gnawing in the pit of her stomach.

The only person inside was old Rabbi Cohen, who was sitting at a large table reading the Bible in the dim light of the candle. She had often seen him clutching the Bible like a child clutches her beloved rag doll, as he shuffled around the ghetto. Disheartened, she slumped down on the floor in a corner. Another pain, greater than the hunger gripped her heart. It was the memory of seeing her precious husband shot before her eyes by the Nazis, and his body thrown onto the back of a truck like refuse from the streets.

As the sun rose and made the candle unnecessary, the old Rabbi lifted his eyes, licked his thumb and forefinger and squeezed out the flame. She stared at the smoking wick, and thought of the black smoke that ascended continually from Buchenwald Concentration Camp, and how the Nazis were snuffing out her people.

As she looked at its smoke, she was distracted from her thoughts by the sound of a page being turned in the Rabbi's book. She stared at him for fifteen minutes as he slowly and thoughtfully turned each of its pages with an obvious reverence. His eyes didn't look up for a moment from its contents.

At last she broke the silence:

"Why do you read that book?" There was a bitter cynicism in her tone. He didn't look up, but merely said,

"It is my food."

The gnawing in her stomach made her feel annoyed that he could say such a stupid thing, but before she could answer him he continued,

"Some people have a thousand questions. With this Book I have a thousand answers."

"My mother used to read the Bible all the time. She went to Ravensbruck."

He still didn't look up, but just said,

"Do you have questions or answers?"

Rachel didn't reply. His words echoed in her mind . . .

"Do you have questions or answers…?"

After five minutes he lifted his eyes, adjusted his rimmed glasses on his nose and looked over at her.

"My dear, I warned our people that money had become our god. But they wouldn't listen. They retired this 'raving old Jeremiah.' But I warned them."

He could see that Rachel's facial expression questioned what he meant, so he continued,

"Listen to the Book of Jeremiah, as the God of our fathers speaks to His people:

'How shall I pardon thee for this? Thy children have forsaken Me and sworn by them that are no gods. When I had fed them to the full, they then committed adultery, and assembled themselves by troops in the harlots' houses. They were as fed horses in the morning: every one neighed after his neighbor's wife. Shall I not visit for these things? saith the Lord: and shall not My soul be avenged on a nation as this?"'

The old Rabbi's face looked sullen as he said,

"Then judgment came: 'Their widows are increased to Me above the sand of the seas: I have brought upon them against the mother of the young men a spoiler at noonday: I have caused him to fall upon it suddenly, and terrors upon the city . . . and the residue of them will I deliver to the sword before their enemies, saith the Lord . . . they shall die grievous deaths; they shall not be lamented; neither shall they be buried; but they shall be as dung upon the face of the earth . . . '

"For years I warned our people that they could not love money, commit sexual sins and forget the Law of their God. I told them that He would judge us, to bring us back to Himself if they would not turn from their wickedness. I read them the words of Jeremiah: 'Give glory to the Lord your God, before He cause darkness, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while you look for light, He turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness. But if you will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride; and mine eye shall weep sore, and run down with tears, because the Lord's flock is carried away captive."'
To be continued...

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"The Mystery" continues...

It was late on the night of January 2, 1944. Jerry sat alone in the back of the four engine Lancaster Bomber that the Resistance kept hidden in a large cave near Cherbourg. They had boarded up the entrance with authentic‑looking signs saying that it was condemned and dangerous. They even placed loose rocks at the entrance that crumbled if any of the boards were moved.

He checked his parachute once again, and upon command from a member of the crew, jumped into the darkness of the night and looked skyward to see the plane fly off into the distance.

The following day, a farmer drove him into Berlin. Jerry told him that his motorbike had had a blowout and lay crumpled in a ditch. A large bruise on the elbow of his right arm and a cut on his forehead that he received when he landed on rocky ground the night before seemed to authenticate his story in the man's mind.

The following night, Jerry entered a bar and saw an officer of the SS sitting alone. There was no way he could even remotely inquire about aircraft assembly plants, without arousing suspicion. He planned merely to make a friend and try to gauge the man's loyalties to the State. He had hoped that he would find someone who believed that the Nazi cause was unjust.

In German he asked,

"Do you mind if I sit here?" The man didn't say a word but pushed a chair out with his foot so that Jerry could sit down opposite him. The German was friendly, but even if he had been sympathetic to the Allied cause, there was little chance he would have let it be known. In the course of conversation he found that a week earlier, a soldier whose tongue had been loosened by a few beers, spoke too loudly. He casually said that he considered something that the Third Reich had done had been detrimental to Germany.

About an hour later, the SS showed up and took him away for questioning. At 11:00 a.m. the next day, he was taken to the Main Square and shot in public. His bullet-riddled body was left tied to a post for two days as a warning to others not to resist the State. They wanted it to be known that if they didn't hesitate to shoot one of their own, they would gladly deal with others who refused to come into line with their wishes.

After hearing that, Jerry decided that the only place he would find someone who would give him the information he needed was in one of Berlin's ghettos.

As he stood at the checkpoint of the largest of the ghettos, an officer looked closely at his papers and asked,

"Why are you wanting to enter here?"

Jerry answered with an air of authority,

"We understand that a number of Norwegian children are being hidden by the Jews. I have come to make a few inquiries. I find that a little money here and there can loosen the tightest tongue, especially when the belly is hungry."

The officer smiled, obviously impressed that the orders came directly from Bormann himself, and said,

"To make sure you are not put in danger, I will provide you with an escort of two soldiers and my personal vehicle."

As the automobile was driven through the ghetto, Jerry looked in horror at starving women whose husbands had either been imprisoned in the nearby Concentration Camps or shot. They were lying with their children on the sidewalks. Their emaciated faces and pleading and empty eyes slowly followed his car.

After driving around for about ten minutes, he told the driver to stop the vehicle, charged both soldiers to stay in the car, and walked over to a woman who lay on the cold sidewalk.
To be continued...

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Chapter Eight: Tall Order

"We want him killed but we don't want any holes in the uniform!" It was a strange order, but an important one. Churchill himself had requested that the Resistance find out exactly where the aircraft assembly plants were stationed in Berlin, and Jerry was the only one who qualified for the task of finding out that information. The Allies wanted detailed maps for their bombers, and he was familiar with Berlin as he had often traveled there on business while in Waldenberg. He spoke the language, and most important, they could trust him to get the job done. All that was needed was a uniform to fit a man who was six feet one inch tall and the ID to go with it.

In accordance with the tall order, two members of the Resistance followed a lanky SS officer as he walked out of a club late one night and down a lonely street towards one of the many brothels of Paris. It was unusual to see a Nazi officer in that part of the town by himself, but he was obviously drunk and therefore not too concerned about what could happen to him. The man was so inebriated, one of the Frenchmen merely had to whisper,

"Hey Fritz," and when the soldier turned towards him, the other quickly put a piece of wire around his neck and pulled tight. It was quick, quiet and clean . . . the uniform was delivered in perfect condition.

Jerry was straining at the bit to do something big to frustrate the Nazi cause before he left for Britain. The plan was to drop him by parachute in a field about three miles east of Berlin. He would have to bury his parachute, make his own way to the city, and locate as many assembly plants as he could within one week. Then he would have to get back to the airfield and be picked up at 1900 hours, seven nights later. The only way they could possibly carry out such a dangerous assignment was for the plane to land and take off in thick fog, something that was a certainty in that area at that time of the year. The risks both of air and ground travel would be great, but if he could deliver the information to the Allies, the hazards were well worth it.

He would carry false papers giving him direct orders from Hitler's personal secretary, Martin Bormann. They were a mandate giving Jerry free course in Berlin to carry out specific details of Bormann's brainchild to purify the German race, producing what was referred to as the Aryan elite. The "Fountain of Life," predicted Bormann, would produce 10,000 purified children by the end of the war, who would live in 22 homes administered by the society. The Nazis had already torn 200,000 children with Aryan characteristics from their parents in Norway, Poland and Czechoslovakia to be raised as Germans.
To be continued...

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No God

One thing after another fueled Jerry's fire of rage against the Nazis, and it was taking its toll. A number of Frenchmen had been fighting alongside them. They gathered at the famed Velodrome, waved French flags and wore German uniforms. They were called the "Legion of Volunteers Against Bolshevism." Their only complaint was that the Germans weren't giving them enough to do. They were tired of watching roads and railway stations. They wanted to hunt down the Resistance and those they called "terrorists."

On hearing that these Frenchmen sympathized with the Germans, Jerry decided that he would soon leave France and go to Britain. Some days later, someone gave him some of Lilian's belongings. Among them was the Bible that his father read from as he prayed that Britain and France would deliver him and his family from the Nazis. He muttered,

"Some help that was!" then threw it to the floor and spat out,

"There is no God!"

That conclusion seemed to justify his anger. The very thought of a Divine Being made him bitter. He had seen "God with us" engraved on the belt buckles of the Nazi soldiers. Even the demented Fuhrer believed in God. A year earlier, he came across portions of Hitler's "Mein Kampf." When the First World War began and lifted Hitler from obscurity, it was recorded in his book how the war elated him by saying,

"I fell on my knees and thanked Heaven from an overflowing heart."

Jerry's newfound atheism gave him some sort of solace and explanation for the sufferings he saw around him. If there was an omnipotent God, how could He sit idly by and watch his sister and Jean suffer? How could a "God of love" let his father, Monique and her family, the Italian priests, and women and children be so brutally murdered? And of all things, how could He do nothing while the Nazis were slaughtering millions of Jews, His "chosen people"? Talk of horrifying things had trickled back from the camps. He kept hearing more of rumors of innocent children being used by "doctors" as guinea pigs in testing lethal germs, amputations and toxins. These came with so much more detail; he couldn't help but believe them. Polish and Soviet officials estimated that 1.5 million people were put to death at the Maidanek Concentration Camp. The victims were Jews and Christians--men, women and children from every nation in Europe. The camp was in an area covering 670 acres and was surrounded by an electric barbed fence. Outside the fence there were 14 machinegun turrets. Prisoners were processed very efficiently. They were first herded into the bathhouses and stripped. Then their clothes were sent to Germany to supplement the German wardrobe. They were then moved into another room that was sealed except for holes placed high in the roof.

From the holes, canisters of a toxic gas were dropped below. The warm showers the people took opened their pores, permitting the gas to take effect more quickly. Prison guards watched through glass panes in the ceiling to make sure everyone was dead.

Bodies were then removed and taken to the furnace, where teeth and gold fillings were knocked out and sold later. Bodies were burned in 10‑12 minutes, meaning that when the crematoriums were efficiently used, 1900 bodies could be burned a day. The ashes were then sold to German farmers as fertilizer.

No . . . there was no God.
To be continued.

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Two months later...

Two months later Hitler's government announced a new program designed to weed out Germans who were less than perfect. Doctors would sterilize them for the glory of the Reich. Under the new law, men and women would be sterilized if they were "idiots" or schizophrenics or if they suffer from depression, epilepsy or chorea or have "a physical weakness."

That clinched it for Francois. One of his children had polio, and the disease had left her physically weak. Very weak. For his children and for his wife's sake, he had to quickly leave his beloved Berlin. This was despite claims by the Nazis (under international pressure) that they would abate the campaign against the Jews.
The day the small Berdau family left Berlin for France they heard that terror had gripped the fashionable Kurfurstendamm district. A gang of 200 angry Nazis viciously beat a group Jews, screaming "Destruction to Jews!" Any cooperation of Germans with Jews brought about immediate punishment.

Towns in the Cologne district forbad any Jews from settling there. Even Barbers weren't allowed to cut their hair. If they did so, they were arrested as "race defilers." If any Germans became romantically involved with Jews, both were arrested and sent to separate Concentration Camps. The males were sent to Lichtenberg and the females went to Moringen.
Francois sold his business to a German publishing company, gathered his earnings and his family and took a fast train to Paris. They then traveled on to the Island of Corsica.

He was surprised how little the Island had changed in the twenty or so years he had been gone. He showed his family where he went fishing, and where he went hiking with his friends. He showed them a tree house he built. He smiled as he pointed out that it was still in the tree…after all the years.

As soon as he purchased his farm on Corsica he decided to build the secret room to hide his family should persecution spread throughout Europe. His fears were soon realized as he watched the conquering of the countries that surrounded Germany. One by one they fell, while the world passively watched.

Despite his provision, he never used the room to hide his family. When it became evident that the Germans would conquer France, he instead sent his wife and children to friends in Britain, deciding that his German citizenship and the fact that he spoke fluent German would ensure his safety. It did.
The Resistance met with him just before the occupation, and decided that he should be publicly known as a German sympathizer, but would secretly work with the French. This is why Bonnier so admired his friend.

Few of the locals knew that Francois was loyal to France, and because they saw him as a Nazi sympathizer, the French hated him. He had even been seriously beaten by a group of fishermen, because they saw him as a traitor. Despite the beating, Francois didn't let his true loyalties be known. The beating actually worked in favor of the Resistance. From then on the Nazis completely trusted Francois, and he often hosted dinners for local Nazi leaders, giving them wine, women, song, and the fatted pig.

This was one reason that the Germans never discovered the secret room filled with weapons. There was another reason. This one that made both Francois and all that knew of its location, quietly smile. The arsenal was hidden under Francois' pigsty, and the pigsty was always in a pigsty. Piles of stinking waste covered the concrete floor, ensuring that that immediate area was never searched. Only once did the Nazis come close to finding the arsenal. In their efforts to uncover members of the local Resistance, they decided to thoroughly search every part of the island. That included Francois' property.

They systematically checked all areas of the farm, except for a certain part of the floor of the pigsty. Two soldiers thrust their bayonets into a few piles of straw. They checked out the pig food, and crawled into a foul-smelling area where the pigs slept at night. They even tipped over a large water container, revealing nothing but a solid concrete floor.

Concrete also protruded out of the filth in two other places in the sty, giving the impression that the whole floor was rock-solid. And it was…except for one eighteen-inch square, three-inch deep concrete trap door that led to the huge arsenal of weapons. He had drilled a tiny hole through the door and when he wanted to lift it, he simply threaded a nail attached to some strong thin wire through the hole, and when he pulled it upward, it lifted the door. The opening was just big enough for the lean Frenchman to get into and pass out weapons to thankful Resistance leaders.

To be continued.


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Tyrant

Jerry's eyes boggled at the array of weapons that they possessed on the island. One of the leaders explained that the Allies had secretly armed them, and that what Jerry saw was only a small part of a huge arsenal. As they drank wine in flickering candlelight, the local resistance leader explained that the supply was kept in the basement of a local farm. It had been there for years, and although there had been numerous searches, the Nazis had never found it. This was because of its ingenious location.

Jerry was told that in 1939, a man named Francois Berdau had built a secret room to hide his family from the Germans. He was a Frenchman by birth, but in 1915 he had had moved to Berlin and set up a bookbinding business. In the mid 20's he fell in love with and married a pretty Jewish girl named Ingrid.

Bonnier, the local Resistance leader greatly admired Francois, not only because they were the best of friends before the occupation, but because of what he had been doing for the cause of France. During the evening, he gave Jerry the details of his friend's background.

Francois, who had majored in political studies at a Parisian University, became deeply fascinated with what was happening in the Germany political arena in 1932. Adolf Hitler, the leader of the National Socialist party had gained an incredible 37% of the vote in a run-off election for the presidency of Germany. That meant that more than 13 million Germans wanted him as their leader, despite some of his radical ideas.

Hitler openly clashed with the existing German government because Chancellor von Papen refused to give the Nazi leader a Cabinet seat. Earlier, the then President of Germany refused Hitler's demand to be made a dictator. Hitler said that he could no longer tolerate the present government and that it would only be a matter of time until the Nazi party gained total victory. Hitler offered the promise of a restored economy and dignity to the German people, and millions were excited by his words.

What fascinated Francois was that Hitler's words were almost prophetic. On March 23rd, 1933 Hitler was granted virtual dictatorial powers.

As Francois continued to follow the political scene, he couldn't help but become a little concerned. Hitler's newly founded power meant that he could make laws by decree, without submitting them to the Reichstag. Nevertheless, he decided that he should attend a political rally and hear the charismatic leader himself.

As he entered the huge hall, the atmosphere was electric and very well organized. By the time Hitler made his entrance to the platform, there was an overwhelming sense of excitement in the air. Francois had never felt anything like it. Hitler was small in stature, but his words were full of power, full of hope, and the huge crowd showed their delight with roaring applause. It was as though there was a mysterious authority that came with each word. Even though he had gone there to formulate an impartial opinion, Francois found himself standing when the crowd stood. He applauded when they did. He joyfully shouted with the throng, and even saluted Hitler with them. He had never felt such soul-stirring enthusiasm for any other cause.

But when he heard Hitler say, "Treason toward the nation and the people shall in future be stamped out with ruthless barbarity" he stopped roaring with the crowd. He stood silently and soberly calmed himself. In a moment of time he drew on his political knowledge. Anyone who would use such words could only be a tyrant.

His concerns were heightened when billboards were placed around Berlin saying, "Jews the world over are trying to crash the new Germany." On May 10th, 1933 a huge bonfire was lit in front of Berlin University and thousands of schoolchildren watched as books were burned. The same was done in Munich. The wide-eyed children who observed the spectacle were told that it was for the good of the Fatherland.

This horrified Francois. One of the main reasons he had chosen to be in the book binding business was because he loved the knowledge that books passed onto following generations. Among other things, books had the ability to show mistakes made in history, so we could learn from them and not make the same mistakes. When he read that the Nazi Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick had said that schools must constantly emphasize that the infiltration of the German people with alien blood, especially Jewish and Negro, must be prevented, he began to seriously consider returning with his family to France. He told Ingrid to keep herself and the two children indoors as much as she possibly could, while he made inquires as to the possibility of leaving.
To be continued.

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