MemChurch Daily
March 9, 2021
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PRACTICING HOPE
The daily newsletter of the Memorial Church
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Dear friends,
Welcome to "Practicing Hope," the daily newsletter of the Memorial Church. Today we are honored to feature the words of Rebecca Araten '22 who has been working to convene communities on campus in solidarity with Uyghur activism. Most recently she organized and invited support for the event, 'Activists and Academics on the Uyghur Genocide' which the Memorial Church Student Advisory Board co-sponsored in February. We hope that her reflection and call to action invite you into the importance of this issue.
For the latest news from the Memorial Church check our website and calendar listings.
The Memorial Church of Harvard University
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REFLECTION
Rebecca Araten '22
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By Rebecca Araten '22
This past Tisha B’Av, I was distraught. The day of fasting on the Jewish calendar would tend to elicit bitter feelings, as it commemorates a whole host of tragedies that struck the Jewish people: on this day in Biblical times, both the First and Second holy Temples were destroyed, and the Jews were exiled from their homeland. In modern times, Tisha B’Av was the day the Nazi Party approved the “Final Solution” that would lead them to systematically destroy one third of world Jewry.
But I was upset about more than these historical events. As I mourned the past tragedies of Jewish communities, I realized that some groups are experiencing these tragedies today. Right around the time of Tisha B’Av, disturbing footage depicting the persecution of Uyghurs was circulating through the internet. I felt like I was watching a reenactment of this line from Lamentations: “My eyes are spent with tears, My heart is in tumult, My being melts away Over the ruin of my unfortunate people.”
The Uyghurs are a people from Central Asia, living mostly within the borders of China, in a region referred to as “Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region” or “East Turkestan.” The majority of Uyghurs are Muslim, and the Chinese government has been persecuting them for their religious and ethnic differences from the Han Chinese people. Their mosques have been destroyed, their people have been sent to internment camps, their women sterilized, and their bodies exploited for forced labor. The footage that I saw depicted Uyghur men blindfolded, heads-shaven, waiting to be loaded onto trains. It seemed eerily similar to images from the Holocaust.
Mourning the destruction that once befell my people allowed me to recognize the destruction that Uyghur people are experiencing right now. I was grateful to find a group of similarly concerned Jews coalescing in the weeks following Tisha B’Av. Together, we formed the Jewish Movement for Uyghur Freedom. We learned from our Uyghur advisors about all the different ways for Jewish communities, leaders, and institutions to support their work. We brought the work to Harvard students in a number of ways: with Harvard Uyghur language preceptor Dr. Gülnar Eziz, we raised money for Uyghur Academy to run a Sunday school for Uyghur children in the Boston area. Uyghur HLS alum Rayhan Asat has courageously led us in circulating petitions demanding the freedom of her brother Ekpar, an entrepreneur who has been imprisoned by the Chinese government for almost five years, just because he is Uyghur.
I have been heartened to see the ways our campus communities have come together to support this cause, by signing petitions, attending events, and ensuring that we are not silent on this issue. Recently, a Harvard Human Rights Working Group has formed in the hopes of planning more campus campaigns and actions. There is always more work to be done. We cannot stop after just one petition. Before the United States entered World War II, Harvard was silent about the horrors of the Holocaust, and nobody spoke up until the United States had stake in the war. We have a chance to act now, and we must not make the same mistake.
Rebecca Araten studies History and Literature and Women, Gender, and Sexuality. She finds a home with the Harvard Hillel community, where she is inspired by the Jewish Journeys of those around her. She is currently working with an interfaith team to build more opportunities for women and people of all genders to share their faith experiences and journeys. She also works with the Jewish Movement for Uyghur Freedom to build campus solidarity for Uyghurs.
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