'March of the Living' is a pilgrimage each May from Auschwitz to Birkenau in Poland by young Jewish students and special invited Gentile guests.
2005 it happened I was one of these Gentile guests as part of the Christian mission Bridges for Peace,a Christian mission based in Jerusalem. At that time highly acclaimed missioner and now, Christian Today senior writer Ron Ross was an 'international radio missions director'.
My invitation came as result of Ron Ross and my ministry as the Australian cricket chaplain having been Australian team chaplain for 17 years and then from 2001 Life After Cricket. My wife Delma was unable to come and I requested my life-time friend Peter Scotland, whose father, Tom, in WWII as a bomber pilot dropped supplies into Warsaw in 1944.
There were 48 Gentile delegates on this Bridges for Peace coach tour which took in Auschwitz, Birkenau, the March of the Living, Krakow, Madjanek and then into the Ukraine seeing first hand ministry to the Jewish Diaspora.
After our return a short video from our photographs and video shoots was produced to show congregations, men's breakfasts and dinners along with youth groups on our Country Town Tours missions.
This is that video:
Dr Mark Tronson is a Baptist minister (retired) who served as the Australian cricket team chaplain for 17 years (2000 ret) and established Life After Cricket in 2001. He was recognised by the Olympic Ministry Medal in 2009 presented by Carl Lewis Olympian of the Century. He mentors young writers and has written 24 books, and enjoys writing. He is married to Delma, with four adult children and grand-children. Dr Tronson writes a daily article for Christian Today Australia (since 2008) and in November 2016 established Christian Today New Zealand.
Mark Tronson's archive of articles can be viewed at http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/mark-tronson.html