Jack of Harts

A man was murdered and it enraged a nation.

Men and women went out to protest with their families, decrying the foul action.

And then the paramilitary forces that had long been pushing violent actions against those who unjustly held the wealth of the masses arrived with a plan. The police were there, but were ordered to stand back and let them do what they came to do. They walked up and down the streets, shattering windows. They threw bricks and stones at minority-owned businesses. They burned and they smashed and they looted one minority neighborhood after another. They killed people on the streets. They desecrated places of worship, graves, schools, and hospitals. They demolished homes.

Shards of broken glass littered the streets like crystals.

The cheering and jeering crowds, the looters and burners and beaters, the socialist paramilitary organization that terrorized a nation, left entire neighborhoods in ruins and flames licked the night.

What I described here did not happen last night.

It happened eight decades ago, on the night of November 9, 1938, in National Socialist Germany. They call it Kristallnacht, and it was only the beginning. Their programs, and the wars they started, would kill nearly 100 million people within a decade.

I pray that we do not let history repeat itself this time.