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There is no propaganda in these sto- ries. Only truth. And from this truth, I hoped, compassion. The following week, Gail and I told Ron that we thought the rev- erend had crossed a line. We won- dered if a man who would call the Holocaust "propaganda" should serve on a committee charged with honor- ing diversity. I called Lori at home. Lori plead- ed that we all continue to work together. Gail and I should forgive the reverend. We could not. After the reverend resigned, Lori, too, resigned. Her uncle is the father-in-law of the man who cuts my hair, the father of a man my husband works with. Lori's sister cuts my husband's hair. How intertwined our lives are. And yet, despite the intimacy of her sister's fingers in my husband's hair, her cousin's fingers in mine, despite our wishes and modern ways, like our counterparts in the Middle East, we felt governed by our beliefs and our blood. But unlike our counterparts in the Middle East, we have the security of life in America: we live in similar homes and work at similar jobs. Several months later, Lori came back to our meetings. Ron had called her and told her we still consider her an integral part of our planning. When we saw each other for the first time since our schism, we hugged — tenuously at first, and then she pulled me close to her, and I drew her to me. Then we released each other, and went to work. "Do you think you are the only ones who suffered?" At Paramount Bank, we believe that our customers are our greatest assets. That's why we've created complete banking and financial services with our customers in mind. From our convenient hours to our wide range of products, everything we do at Paramount Bank is designed to meet customer needs. FDIC the Holocaust and I said that it would be in the "Lessons" section, the reverend said, "That's propagan- da." My head went into a spin. Ron, the deputy superintendent, levitated momentarily from his chair. Gail's face turned red and beaded with sweat. I turned to the reverend and said in the most rational voice I could summon, "What do you mean "It's history," the rev- erend answered. "It's not part of the religion." I quoted Eli Wiesel, still trying to remain adult and reasonable. "Yes, but in the Holo- caust only Jews died because of their religion. Not all victims were Jews, but all Jews were victims." "A lot of people have suffered from geno- cides," Lori interjected. "The Armenians. The Cambodians. The Bosnians." Then Gail said she still lives with the fear that it could happen again, and she always keeps a suitcase packed, her passport in it. And Lori told how her mother fled her village in 1948 on a bus in the middle of the night with only the clothes she was wearing. "Should my family have had to lose their homes?" she . - demanded. And Gail, whose father survived Auschwitz, whose half-brother sur- vived execution when his young mother pushed the 5-year-Old into a pit of the already dead and dying just before she herself was shot, demand- ed, "Should my family have had no place to go?" Lori responded, "Gail, do you think you are the only ones who suf- fered? Not only do I understand your suffering, but I've experienced it in the same magnitude. I want to understand you, and you to under- stand me. We can move forward, but how can we accomplish that without openness?" We had ripped past our trendy clothes and civil facades. The beliefs we all hide in such civilized ways erupted. In that room of mustard yellow walls, fluorescent lights and Formica tables, the power of history was alive and painful. Fifty years after the last Jews were freed from Auschwitz, almost 50 years after the last bus carrying young Palestinian Publicity Deadlines The normal deadline for local news and publicity items is noon Thursday, eight days prior to issue date. The deadline for out-of- town obituaries is 10 a.m. Tues- day, three days prior to issue date. All material must be typewrit- ten, double-spaced, on 81 /2 x 11 paper and include the name, address, and daytime telephone number of sender.