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The massacre of almost 15 million Eastern Orthodox
Christians in the Ukraine right before World War
II has been intentionally forgotten. The guilty
parties in this blackout that are flushing the
horrific slaughter of Christians down Orwellian
memory holes are the American mainstream media,
academia, the government, Catholic clergy and
ministers of other Christian denominations. Most
Christians living in America do not even realize
the genocide of Ukrainians occurred. Just ask
anyone you know who are not of Ukrainian ancestry
about the deliberate murder of Ukrainians prior
to the Second World War and you will probably
get a blank stare.
You will definitely get a different
reaction if you ask Ukrainian-Americans about
the intentional slaughter of their ancestors.
They will probably express their anger and frustration
about the fact that government officials, educators,
priests, ministers and talk show hosts never talk
about the genocide of their ancestors. People
of Ukrainian descent are amazed that there are
no television programs, movies, documentaries
or hand-wringing editorials about the wholesale
slaughter of 15 million of their kinfolk. The
body count of almost 15 million (and the number
is continually being revised upward as facts come
out) has not been pounded into the American psyche.
It needs to be implanted into America’s
consciousness starting now — and never forgotten!
It is outrageous that the slaughter
of Christians in the Ukraine has been silenced
in the United States. There is no excuse for this.
The Ukraine is a civilized country in east central
Europe between Russia and Poland, and is a few
hundred miles east of Germany. It is near the
countries where most of America’s European
ancestors originated.
It not surprising that the
mainstream media, government or academia in the
United States deliberately ignores the murder
of 15 million Christians in the Ukraine. These
institutions are hostile to Christianity, and
their anti-Christian virulence increases with
time. What boggles the mind is the fact that Christian
leaders have let this slaughter be forgotten.
For example: I recently attended
a seminar hosted by a Christian minister who is
a talk show host on Christian television and radio.
I asked him during one of the question and answer
sessions about why Christian leaders never talk
about the martyrdom of Christians. I used the
butchering of 15 million Ukrainians as the textbook
example of the vicious killing of Christians never
publicly talked about by ministers, pastors or
priests. He stated that he did not know that millions
of Christians had been murdered in the Ukraine
and quickly skipped to the next question.
It appears that Christian leaders
feel it is unimportant for Christians to remember
the massacres of fellow Christians. They must
want the world to forget! When was the last time
they discussed early Christian martyrs savaged
immediately after Jesus’ brutal crucifixion?
When was the last time they publicly stated that
various anti-Christian entities have continuously
slaughtered Christians for the past 2000 years?
If Christians do not remember the massacres of
their spiritual brothers, who will? Definitely
not the Godless, atheistic American mainstream
media, academia or government!
Bloodthirsty, homicidal maniacs
who called themselves Communists in the Soviet
Union massacred the Ukrainians. Why did these
Bolsheviks murder the Ukrainians? Books like Robert
Conquests' The Harvest of
Sorrow; published fifty years after
the slaughter, note that the reasons for the killings
were economic and political: Stalin wanted revenge
against the Ukrainians for successfully resisting
collectivization of farms in the 1920’s.
He wanted to make a brutal statement demonstrating
Soviet power that the Ukrainians would never forget.
Unfortunately, it seems like
no writer focuses on the religious and ethnic
hatreds that helped fuel the annihilation of almost
a third of Ukrainian Christians. It is fairly
self evident that very few of the Bolsheviks orchestrating
the deliberate slaughter of almost 15 million
Ukrainians were Ukrainian or Christian. What scholars
must discover and expose is exactly who the Communist
were — lest we forget and let them do it
again to Christians.
The silence in the mainstream
media, academia and government in the United States
in the 1930’s was an endorsement by these
institutions of the massacre in the Ukraine. The
continued blackout by the American media, academia
and government is an ongoing endorsement, by omission,
of the slaying of 15 million Christians. Obviously,
as indicated by actions, leaders in these American
institutions have very little religious, cultural
or ethnic connections with the blood of the Ukrainian
martyrs.
There appears to be a stench
of religious bigotry and racism by the rulers
of these American entities. We must find out if
the movers-and-shakers of the mainstream media,
academia and government are bigoted against the
people and religion of the Ukraine. We must ask
ourselves if racism and religious intolerance
motivate their silence about the crimes against
humanity that were committed against Ukrainian
Christians by Bolsheviks.
A critical awareness for Catholics
and Christians of all persuasions to develop is
a congenital sense of revulsion for the Communist
sickle and hammer. The sickle and hammer stands
for the desire of murderous Bolsheviks to annihilate
Catholics and other Christians. A truth for Christians
of all denominations to understand is currently
there are many educated people in the media, academia
and government who know exactly what the sickle
and hammer truly stand for but consciously sympathize
with its meaning. Many still proudly wear it and
endorse it. This is truly a hate symbol and the
pending national hate crimes legislation must
note the homicidal hatred of Communists for Christians.
Individually and collectively,
Christians must confront their church and political
leaders and demand the end to the silence about
the massacre of the Ukrainian Christians. There
must be answers as to why the perpetrators were
never hunted down for their crimes against humanity.
We must insist on a federally-funded Ukrainian
Holocaust museum as a symbol to remind the politicians,
academics and media moguls in the United States
that they must never forget, that they owe the
Ukrainians apologies for years of silence and
culpability, and that they never let a massacre
like this happen again.
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