“Indeed, it must end. As I have told those of you who are in my larger family, and as the rabbi has told you friends sharing our home with us, it is my conviction that we are in imminent danger of discovery. It is urgent, therefore, that you guests, you of God’s people from that land where our mutual patriarchs walked, you friends whom we have grown to love as our own… it is urgent that you leave us, and that we make provision for you to continue your journey where you will be safer than you henceforth can be here. We have been making and will this night and into the morrow make all needed preparations for such a journey. Communications are already going out to prepare the way, as the Scriptures remind us was the appointed role of the prophet Elijah, and to make straight the paths you will be required to walk.”

He paused a moment, then continued.

“There is a heaviness of spirit in such a parting. We all have lived daily for years with the dangers inherent, for most of you because of the mere blood of the Hebrew children that flows in your veins, for the rest of us because of our decision to count ourselves among those who love the people of God.

“At the same time, perhaps there can be a sense of anticipation as well, in view of what lies ahead in the provision and plan of God. It is our hope and prayer that you will be able to retrace the pathways prepared for you by your own rabbi earlier this year, all the way to the safety of Switzerland.”

An audible rustle of suppressed gasps, whispers, and sighs went through the room, for the ultimate destination toward which preparations were being made had not been divulged until this very moment.

“I want, therefore, to take these final minutes we have together to share with you, my family and friends, in the most sacred and holy observance that we as Christians experience together. It is appropriate and fitting to do so, in the manner in which our Savior similarly shared with his friends on the night before he was crucified.

“For Jews and Christians to come together in one accord at such a time as this, to mutually participate in Communion and Passover, is perhaps unprecedented. I have not heard of such a gathering in my life. But I ask you all, of both faiths, to put aside differences of doctrine and belief for this brief season, and to open yourselves this night to one another, to our common Hebrew heritage, and to our common God—Yahweh, the Lord—our Father in heaven. We are all, at this moment, common pilgrims in the Egypt of a dreadful exile. You who will soon leave this place will go seeking a land of peace and freedom—truly a land of promise.