Tor nach Zion e.V.

In May a group of craftsmen of the Saxony friends of Israel prepared and built floors and ways for the visitors.

During the week of Passover we celebrated the first time the Seder in another congregation. Our format „For the good of Zion I will not keep silent” should encourage Christians to build relationships to Israel, Jews and the Hebrew roots of our believe. The Seder is usually celebrated in a family setting.

In this new Jewish year 5.777 we celebrated again the feast of tabernacles. At the 16th of October, we held a church service under the theme „The law of Mose and the life with Jesus.“

In mid-March, a group of craftsmen from the Ore mountains that belong to the Saxonian friends of Israel and I have been for another working input in Oswiecim-Brzezinka. A centerpiece of the art piece are six pillars that commemorated the six million murdered Jews during the Holocaust.

Together with Rick and Dafna Wienecke we had the pleasure to take part in the 20th and last Saxony Israel conference in Glauchau. The conference had as its theme: „Why do the nations plan evil together? Why do they make useless plans?“ (Psalm 2:1) It is about the run against the authority and sovereignty of God – also in the church – e.g. in form of Bible criticism, that is based on making God up from the mainstream. The nations plan evil against the existence of the Jewish state but mean the God of Israel.

On 26th of January 2017, we celebrated in connection with the day of commemoration for the victims of National Socialism the movie premiere of our film “Survival – Three Jewish generations”. For many years now Maria Hoffmann has supported former Leipzig Jews and other Holocaust survivors and their descendants in Israel.

In May and June, we welcomed former Jews from Leipzig in our city with their children and grandchildren. It was a privilege to celebrate with Josef Aaron his 81st birthday. He enjoyed the comfort and security in the home of family Kluge. He shared his horrifying memories of Bergen-Belsen with pupils from the Reclamgymnasium (Reclam high school). Josef reached their heart. Their written letters and a collection of money for him are evidence of this.

How wonderful is our God of Israel?! How blessed are we by His people of Israel?! (see Romans 9:4-5)

The weeks with Maria in Israel have been amazingly beautiful. We had a lot of lovely meetings with our longtime friends. Their hospitality was just spectacular! At the same time, I feel how the Israelis are in need of us – not as „helpers“ or „knights in shining armour“ but as reliable friends. We own this to them and all the Jews after these 2.000 years of horrifying history of Christianity.

It was very important and quite urgent to finish the film project about the survivors of the Shoa because they are running out of time and their health is getting worse.

At the end of August Maria Hoffmann and Astrid Hornoff flew on behalf of our association, the city of Leipzig and the Israeli religious community of Leipzig to New York to do searches about former Jews from Leipzig at the Leo Baeck Institute.

A delegation under the leadership of the head major Burkhard Jung traveled in December 2015 to Israel, so they could join the celebrations of the 50 year anniversary of diplomatic relations between Germany and Israel. The St. Thomas choir performed under the conduction of Gotthold Schwarz the Christmas Oratorio from J. S. Bach in Jerusalem and Herzliya.

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© Tor nach Zion e.V. 2019