Holocaust survivor Steen Metz speaks at Loyola

When he was only 8 years old, Steen Metz from Odense, Denmark, experienced an upheaval in his life that would impact him and his family for years to come.

When Hitler invaded Denmark in 1940, Metz and his family were among the estimated 500 Danish people taken from their homes and placed in Theresienstadt in 1943, a concentration camp in the Czech Republic.

After 18 months and the death of his father due to starvation and malnutrition, Metz and his mother were finally saved by Swedish "White Buses."

This left Metz's mother hard of hearing and with anxieties over daily life, and Metz fatherless and behind in his classes.

"I think my young age helped," Metz said in a statement to The Phoenix, official student newspaper of Loyola University Chicago. "But I know my mother suffered."

At age 84, Metz has spoken about his experience with over 100,000 students and educators. On April 4, Metz spoke to almost 100 Loyola students.

"After a couple years, I started asking each person to speak with four people about the Holocaust," Metz said. "I've talked to nearly 100,000 people, so you can only imagine how many people have (spread the word)."

In the summer of 2020, Kelsey Lewis, a Loyola junior who's studying anthropology with a minor in peace studies, attended one of Metz's presentations in Lake Zurich.

"I remember what struck me about (Metz) was I didn't know if I had ever, in a history class, heard from a Holocaust survivor from a Scandinavian country," Lewis told The Phoenix. "I mean, it was traumatic, and I think personally he is probably the most genuine person, and I just wanted to hug him."

Lewis, after hearing his speech and meeting Metz, later suggested to the Peace, Justice & Conflict Studies Program director at Loyola, William French, that Metz should speak at Loyola.

"Like Mr. Metz said in his presentation, we only have around five to 10 more years where you can actually sit down with somebody and have a conversation on what they went through," Lewis said.

Megan Flanagan, a first-year student studying early childhood education at Loyola, emphasized the importance of talking to these survivors while they are still alive.

"It's definitely important to hear about stories from individual people to gain a knowledge of how it affected people as a whole, but also how it affected them individually and being able to use that information moving forward," Flannigan said.

"It makes it more real," freshman Alexander de Foy said. "It's going to be different, no matter what, from learning about it in a book or a classroom."

Loyola, being a Jesuit university, has a long history of educating students on interfaith relations, according to French, who stressed the importance of recognizing interfaith issues, especially in regards to the Holocaust.

"Religious schools are often a celebration of our faith," French said. "And that's nice, let's celebrate the good things about the Christian heritage, but let's not ignore the bad spots of our history."

After Metz's presentation at Loyola, audience members asked him questions and many brought up overcoming the dynamics of hatred in the modern age.

"I don't think we will ever overcome these dynamics," French said. "But we have to understand the psychology of aggression and how strong leaders can play the victim card to mobilize anger against a group."

In light of the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine, Metz told the audience during his presentation that it's important to recognize these atrocities and that our current sociopolitical climate may end up becoming worse than before.

Metz also explained in the speech that it's this generation's job as the last people to hear from Holocaust survivors to reach out to them when possible in order to educate future generations on the first-hand encounters of these genocides.

"The Holocaust is one of the most well-documented periods in all human history, and it's a testimony to the potentials of human cruelty," said Maxwell Dziabis, a master's student in Theology at Loyola.

"There's this need to maintain the story of (the Holocaust) being something powerful that should never happen again and should always be taught in school."