Walter Brundl
by Ben Verdi

Six Million. That is the number of people killed in the holocaust.  During a twelve year period beginning in 1933, a man named Adolph Hitler started a war which in the end led to the  persecution of  many people: Jews, Socialists, Labor workers, Handicapped people, anyone who Hitler saw as a threat to his control.  His victims were targeted for who they were and what they believed. They were men, women and children all across Europe and especially in Germany where Hitler ruled. This wasn’t 500 years ago.  This occurred when my grandparents were kids like you and me.  Many people at the time knew that Hitler’s actions were wrong.  Some even had the courage to stand up and fight against Hitler’s actions.  I would like to tell you the story of one of these brave people, my great grandfather, Walter Brundl.

My great grandfather Walter was a Lutheran minister living in Germany with his wife and seven kids, one of whom is my grandma Alei.  As a Christian minister, his life’s work was to    deliver the beliefs of God and Jesus.  Even though many people followed the Nazi party, my great grandfather, Walter, believed that Hitler’s ideas were wrong no matter what race, ethnicity, or religion was targeted.  He had the courage to put himself and his family at risk to stand up for social justice and against Hitler’s injustice towards the people of Europe.

One Sunday morning, in a small  town in Germany, my great grandfather was delivering his sermon when he heard a group of Nazi soldiers marching by his church.  He was standing  in the church when he heard the noise getting louder and louder.  My great grandfather’s church is very big.  The distance from the pulpit to the front steps outside, is 65 steps. I often think about how many times, during those 65 steps, he thought about turning around and not putting his and his family’s lives in danger. But what kept him walking, past the two Nazi soldiers in the back of the church monitoring his sermon and double checking his message, was the power of his conviction and his belief that the Nazis were wrong in their actions.  When the Nazis approached his church, he shouted for them to never march past a house of God on a Sunday ever again.  This was in part because they were interrupting his sermon but more significantly because what they were marching in support of was so wrong.

This is one of the examples of how my great grandfather stood up for what he thought was right.  It was public knowledge that my great grandfather was opposed to the war and the Nazi party.  When the Nazis burned the local synagogue, where Jewish citizens worshipped, my great grandfather and his wife mourned with the Jewish people who had lost their place of worship.  As a result of my great grandfather’s outspoken actions against the Nazi party, he and his entire family were placed on Hitler’s black list, which meant that they were put at risk of being removed from their community and placed in a concentration camp.  Though Walter knew this was a probable consequence to his actions, it did not get in the way of his bravery and passion to stand up for what he believed.  He was not famous, he wasn’t a public figure, he was just a regular person who was not afraid to stand up for what he believes.

I think this is exactly what Martin Luther King, Jr was trying to do for his whole life.  He knew not everyone could be the leader of a civil rights movement or give famous speeches, but his goal was to have people stand up for the small injustices occurring in their lives.  My great grandfather and Martin  Luther King Jr may not have ever met, but their ideas about social justice and freedom were of the same school of thought.  To quote Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, “when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, ‘Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!’”  My great grandfather knew he could not change the world or the Germans’ views, but in his community, he knew he could make a difference by standing up for what he believed was right in God’s eyes and our own daily lives.  I light this candle in honor of my great grandfather Walter Brundl.