Many people who attended high school or University over the past 20 years in Debrecen, Hungary are familiar with the name Schwarcz Sandor as the man who by miracle, survived 5 concentration camps including Dachau, Muhldorf, Gross-Rosen Auschwitz I and Birkenau. His testimony of how he and a team of fellow incarcerated inmates was forced to entertain the Nazis by playing soccer (football) against a squad of camp personnel adds a unique perspective on the surreal life of the camp. I used to sit for hours listening to him talk about his reminiscences and especially the story of what happened when his crippled cousin was shot while in Sandor's arms as he tried to support him.

He is a survivor who took a perspective that life was a miracle and that he survived when the majority survived was a miracle from God. He taught that he forgave the Germans for what happened. This was the heart of a man touched by God and who knew what forgiveness meant. Though he carried the scars and the nightmares of what occured in those camps to his grave, I will always remember him as one who like Jesus Christ, forgave his tormentors while suffering on the cross for the sins of the world.

(Posted on 2009.11.27.)