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The Jewish Community Center of Middlesex County and the Metuchen Interfaith Clergy Association held the fourth annual Holocaust Memorial program April 20, at the JCC in Edison.

Some of the clergy that attended the event were: Rev. Janice Sutton of Trinity United Methodist Church, Highland Park; Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg of Congregation Beth El, Edison; Imam Moustafa Zayed of the Muslim Center of New Jersey; Rev. Jim Thomas of First Presbyterian Church, Iselin; Rev. Dr. Ronald Owens of New Hope Baptist Church, Metuchen; Rev. Kathleen Tice of Stelton Baptist Church, Edison; Rabbi Deborah Bravo of Temple Emanu-El, Edison; Rabbi Melinda Zalma of Congregation Beth Mordecai, Perth Amboy; and Rabbi Gerald Zelizer of Congregation Neve Shalom, Metuchen.

Also in attendance were the president of the JCC Eric Nacht, JCC Executive Director Dorothy Rubinstein, and Jennine Shpigel, the director of Jewish and Family Programming.

Nacht said the Holocaust was the most horrific period in Jewish history, and we as a society must never forget its lessons.

"We need to set a good example with tolerance," Nacht said.

Rubinstein and her husband, Marvin, who are both children of survivors, said people must be responsible for their actions and not to take life for granted. But, more importantly, there are people that deny the Holocaust ever occurred and because of people like them, it can happen again.

Throughout the evening members of the clergy read poems, sang songs with their choir, and spoke in remembrance of the Holocaust. There was a candle lighting service for survivors and sons or daughters of survivors. The people that lit candles were: the Rubinsteins; Yehuda Shpigel, son of Holocaust survivors; Ernest Bokor, a Holocaust survivor, and his daughter, Ronit Thor; Michael Grodzicki, a Holocaust survivor and his daughter, Gladys Leibowitz; brothers Emil and Bernard Kalfus, who are both survivors; Hank Krager, son of survivors; Rosenberg, son of survivors; Esther Samson, a survivor; and Ellen Romm, daughter of survivors.

The Kalfus brothers told The Jewish State of their experiences in the Holocaust and why Yom Hashoah is important. Emil Kalfus said he was in five different concentration camps from age 17 until he was 22, which included a stay in Birkenau.

"I never lost faith," he said.

He was liberated on April 29, 1945 and said it was one of the greatest days of his life. It is very important that children of today understand what occurred during the Holocaust and realize it must never take place again, he said.

His younger brother, Bernie, who was in the concentration camps for four years, said the Nazis took him in 1940. When the Nazis came to the town, he was working in a sawmill. Bernie said he was separated from his family for two years, but never gave up hope.

He ended up at the same camp as his brother, where he worked in a cabinet shop. One day, the Gestapo surrounded all the boys with machine guns, lined them up, and disrobed them. The doctor took their numbers, then each number was called, and sent to the train for Auschwitz, he said.

"I asked a boy, what is Auschwitz," he said.

Instead of waiting for his number to be called, Bernie quietly walked off the line without being noticed and went to his brother who had an extra jacket -- so he was now wearing his brother's jacket with a different number on it. When his number was called he was nowhere to be found. However, since the Nazis thought he was in Auschwitz now, his number was no longer on the list for food.

"I knew a policeman, he put my name on the list," Bernie said.

The Gestapo eventually found out that he escaped and asked him how he did it. He told him the truth -- that he just walked off of the line.

"Finkelstein (the policeman) said 'whenever you want something you can come to me'," he said.

In 1949, he arrived in New York, happy to be alive. He embraced the feeling of freedom, but also loved the fact that he could eat and didn't have to be hungry anymore.

Jennine Shpigel, whose father-in-law, Shalom Shpigel, was a survivor, said the most miraculous thing was that he was never in any of the concentration camps. He was the oldest of seven children and his family along with other Jews lived secretly in the woods.

Each day Shalom, being the oldest, would go and look for food and supplies. Then one day while looking for food, he was warned not to return to his home in the woods because the Nazis were coming. The Nazis killed everyone in his family, leaving him on his own in his early 20s, Shpigel said.

"He would go from place to place and would stay in a barn or just hide," she said.

Shpigel said at one point Shalom was able to obtain documents that allowed him passage to Palestine, however he ended up in disease-infested Cyprus for a year. From Cyprus he eventually made his way to Israel.

Shalom always tried to live life to the fullest and take whatever came his way, she said. More importantly, he had a great sense of humor and was willing to speak about what happened, because he wanted people to know that it did happen and can't be forgotten.

"The very cool thing was he went onto have four children, those four children have 10 children, and eight grandkids," Shpigel said.