Today is our last day, and it was a day of amazing sites.  We decided to drive to TEREZIN, the site of a Nazi Concentration Camp.This was about an hour's drive out of Prague.   As we drove down a small road headed to the camp, we went through a small town, DUSANSKY. I looked out the window and said, "hey, there's a church there." I had seen the two bell towers. We pulled in and no one was around.   Finally, an older man came out and he spoke a little english.   I explained we were driving and spotted the church.  He was a guide, but the official tour was not till an hour later. However, he generously offered to take us around.  This was a church founded in the 1100's by Polish priests and sisters, the church of the Birth of the Blessed Mother. The church was breath-taking, filled with incredible religious art and historical images.   This is the greatest Bohemian church outside of Prague located in a town that is barely on any map.   I felt that God hade given us the opportunity to see this very holy place. There are still some religious Sisters who pray there everyday for people and their problems.

From there we drove to the town of Terezin and the Nazi camp.  The camp was opened in 1944-1945 to keep prisoners who were forced to work in a factory making equipment for armored tanks of the Nazis.   The tour starts with a walk through a cemetery with hundreds of graves, many with no name, just the number the Nazis gave them. The camp had many exhibits of the lives the prisoners led.   The situations were awful. Men, women, and children were forced to live in unimagineable conditions.  Their diet was 800 calories/day(one Big Mac has almost twice as many calories) and they had to go work in factories for 10-14 hours/everyday; no rest.   Most of the workers died because of the work they were forced to do.   We saw the large rooms where 60-80people were forced to sleep every night; one toilet; one small wood heater to heat an entire room during the winter.  There were very few people who survived till the end of the war. Most of them, adults, weighed less than 100 pounds when soldiers found them.    This camp was one of the "better" camps, compared to Auschwitz and Dachau.

   There were many groups of students there, a number of them German.   It is important for them to know their history. It is also important for us.  There are people who, in our own time, will say things like, "maybe there were no concentration camps", "maybe Hitler or the Nazis were not so bad." These are ridiculous and ignorant statements.   The Nazis killed 6 million Jewish people;20 million Russians; hundreds of thousands of deaf and disabled people, many of them children; thousands of Catholic priests, Sisters and religious Brothers. We must never forget the lessons of what the Nazi leaders (and Communist leaders in Russia and China) did to innocent people.   History is a great teacher if we pay attention.

   We drove back on the very good highways in the Czech Republic.  They are easy to drive; driving around Prague is a nightmare, but my brother finally figured out how to do it.  Europe with its ancient streets(never straight!) and the very narrow lanes makes driving very tough.   Our last night, we shared another great Bohemian/Czech dinner. We walked the famous square one more time; the rain poured down.  Time to pack and go home.  After I get home, I will write one more reflection on the trip.