To commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day 2023, the Deputy Mayor of North Lincolnshire, Cllr Janet Longcake, will be hosting a ceremony in Scunthorpe on Friday 27 January.
The Deputy Mayor is extending an invitation to all local people to join her at the ceremony and to lay a stone in memory of the millions of people who lost their lives in the Holocaust.
Cllr Janet Longcake will be joined by school pupils and various guests from across North Lincolnshire in the Chamber Lecture Theatre at the University Campus North Lincolnshire (UCNL) on Ashby Road at 4pm.
St Barnabas’ Church of England Primary School Choir from Barnetby, will officially open and close the ceremony with a song and other local school children will read poems.
Reverend Graham Lines, the Mayor’s Chaplain; the Young Mayor of North Lincolnshire, Abid Khan of The Multi Faith Partnership; and children from schools in North Lincolnshire including Berkeley Primary School, Althorpe & Keadby Primary School, Luddington & Garthorpe Primary School, St Norbert’s Catholic Primary Voluntary Academy, St Augustine Webster Catholic Voluntary Academy, St Hugh’s Communication and Interactive College and The Axholme Academy are among those taking part in the ceremony.
This year’s theme for Holocaust Memorial Day is ‘Ordinary People’. It explores how ‘ordinary people’ were involved in all aspects of the Holocaust, Nazi persecution of other groups, and in the genocides that took place in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur.
Ordinary people were perpetrators, bystanders, rescuers, witnesses – and ordinary people were victims.
It was ordinary people who made brave decisions and went to extreme lengths to help, to rescue, to save or stand up for those being persecuted.
Holocaust Memorial Day brings together people from different faiths and backgrounds to remember the victims of every genocide and provides an opportunity to consider how ordinary people, can perhaps play a bigger part in challenging prejudice today.
The Deputy Mayor of North Lincolnshire, Cllr Janet Longcake said: “The Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony brings our community together to remember those who lost their lives and honour the survivors whose lives were changed forever.
“We can never forget the atrocities of the past.
“Prejudice and hatred must be challenged by us all to help create a safer future.”
If you would like to attend the ceremony, please call the Civic Office on 01724 296358 to book your place.
