“They forgot the God who had saved them, who had done great deeds in Egypt” (Ps.106:21)

Some thirty years ago I attended a lecture by an esteemed German Jewish historian, Pinchas Lapide.  I recall an ominous warning he issued to his fellow Jews in America and Western Europe.” The greatest danger Jews face today”, he declared, “is not Antisemitism; it is religious indifference. Too many Jews have simply lost interest in their Jewish faith”.

The 106^th Psalm is generally classified as a Historical Psalm. It was likely composed during the Babylonian exile in the sixth century B.C. The Psalmist scolds the Chosen People for forgetting what God had done for them. No fewer than three times in this lengthy Psalm we are told that the people did not remember but rather had forgotten the meaning of their commitment and failed to live according to the covenant. Indeed, they suffered from a collective amnesia!

It is abundantly clear that in the secular West, God is an afterthought and is largely forgotten. The divine commandments are ignored and places of worship are either closed or emptying. Idolatry has replaced genuine worship. “They exchanged their glory, for the image of a grass-eating bull” (Ps. 106:20). Clearly this disturbing trend does not bode well for the future of the West.

May the memory of our Christian faith never fail us. Let the words of a contemporary hymn always inspire us to witness to our faith in Christ: “We remember, we celebrate, we believe.