I recently returned from a day in Berlin, where I was one of more than 900 people, mostly German, who attended the Truth Heals conference held at the Free University, where many of the student protests in the 60’s first erupted. I was there because Andrew Cohen was addressing the group, because many people from EnlightenNext were involved in producing and presenting the day’s events, and because of my background as the daughter of German Jews who had fled the Holocaust.

It was a powerful day, the repercussions of which are still very much alive with me and, I’m sure, will continue to impact all of us who were there for some time to come. This is not the first time such a gathering has taken place. German spiritual teacher Thomas Huebl, who “is convinced that large groups can amplify the process of becoming more conscious” and who spearheaded this coming together for the purpose of Germans confronting the scars of World War II, had assembled three such similar events previously. This year’s conference was held on the 65th anniversary of the war’s end.

The conference got off to an uncompromising and dynamic start with Andrew Cohen’s talk in which he not only set a very big context in which to consider our very somber topic but also in no way diminished the very difficult truths that have not been, up until now, faced by millions of people who were affected, in one way or another, by the horrific tragedies that took place in Nazi Germany. He spoke of evil and its continuing association with German language and culture, the German character that swings between hardness and sentimentality, his experiences with his German students and their refusal to confront their families’ and their nation’s Nazi past, and he spoke about the enormous potential that lies uniquely with Germany, if it were to seize the opportunity and consciously take responsibility for its past and model a more enlightened relationship to our collective human condition. It seemed to me as if he was indicating that the degree to which the horrors of the past are faced could be the degree to which the potential for future development and positivity could be realized. I’d never heard anyone speak so forthrightly of or to Germans about their historical reality and their future potentiality.

And I was curious how his unmitigated remarks were going down in the packed auditorium. But not being a German speaker myself, I was dependent on the simultaneous, though less than perfect, translation that was provided. Nevertheless, I was able to get some insight into people’s reactions in the next session, which was led by a former Nazi soldier. This elderly gentleman had been powerfully attracted to Hitler as a young man, he told us, and eagerly joined the Nazi war effort. Later, during battle, he lost his eyesight and, subsequently, went on to become a psychoanalyst who courageously faced and reconciled with the naïve and misdirected enthusiasms of his youth.

During his presentation he invited audience participants to join him on stage to share their responses to the issues beings addressed. Clearly, people were having strong emotional responses and not everyone took kindly to Andrew’s observations. I was reminded of another point Andrew had raised about the German inclination to assume the victim position—how much they, too, had suffered during the war—and recalled how I had been swayed by similar arguments from German friends and acquaintance. But looking at the situation now in light of the bigger, more objective context that had been set, I could see how this position was an impediment, as Andrew suggested, to getting beyond the stasis and cultivating real change.

The morning ended with a live Skype link with a group of Israelis who were participating in the conference remotely. They spoke eloquently of their connections to the Holocaust and one gentleman recited the Kaddish, one of the holiest prayers in Judaism, which was, at least for me, a particularly moving moment.

The afternoon began with a beautiful dialogue between Tom Steininger, an Austrian philosopher and German editor of EnlightenNext magazine, and Ruth Golan, an Israeli psychoanalyst and student of Evolutionary Enlightenment. Golan poignantly revealed her own resistance to coming to Germany and shared stories about her family’s loss. She also was very direct in saying that she had not come to Germany to offer forgiveness but to find a way to move forward with the Germans. She also drew attention to the fact that it requires a willingness to take responsibility, rather than a simple expression of (and indulgence in) guilt, in order for anyone of us to be motivated to take action and do things differently.

After their exchange, people broke up into small discussion groups. Later, integral philosopher Ken Wilber addressed the conference via a live audio link and provided a developmental context for understanding what had happened in Germany over half a century ago. In particular, he spoke about the “pre-trans fallacy” in which lower forms of reasoning are elevated to higher levels. In other words, the Nazis presented a modern face to the world but, he said, were, in fact, advocating and motivated by pre-modern, or ethno-centric, value systems and drives.

Ken was followed by another moving Skype link with an elderly Jewish woman living in the US, Eva Kor, who as a child with her twin sister had been an inmate at Auschwitz. The young girls, no more than eight or nine at the time, were one of the subjects of the infamous Dr. Mengele in the hideous experiments he conducted on twin children. She spoke eloquently about her experience as a young girl left to die in the camps, her extraordinary will to live, and the courageous decision she made 15 years ago to forgive the Nazis and Dr. Mengele for their crimes. This remarkable woman had made a completely autonomous decision to end the suffering that had plagued her for a lifetime, risking anger and ostracism from fellow survivors by doing so. I was struck by the power and authenticity of what she had done—an act that, as she said, didn’t harm anyone but had, clearly, released her from her painful past. Ms. Kor is the subject of a new documentary entitled Forgiving Dr. Mengele, which chronicles her courageous and uncommon act of forgiveness and the repercussions which ensued.

By the end of the day, which continued well into the evening with fantastic music by the Israeli singer and pianist Assaf Amdursky, I knew I had just participated in a milestone event, though I was hard-pressed to discern, at the time, what it all meant and where it might lead. It was clear to me, however, that much goodwill had been extended by everyone and that there was a genuine desire on the part of many people to begin the difficult task of confronting and reckoning with the stark facts of history and navigate a way forward. Certainly, on a personal level, as someone whose life trajectory had been radically influenced by the Third Reich, I was surprised to experience a degree of liberation from my own years’ of ambivalence towards Germany and the German people. Perhaps it was due to having so many things aired and addressed so openly. In my family as in many German families, Jewish or not, most things were left unsaid. That Germans and Jews had come together to look into the Holocaust in itself was and is a positive and significant step forward.

At the same time, I also felt that it’s now up to the Germans. The Israelis, the organizers of the conference, Andrew Cohen, Thomas Huebl, EnlightenNext volunteers and many others gave enormously to creating this important forum but I have no illusions that the real work still lies ahead. If the Germans and all of us can begin to see this chapter of human history as part of a much larger developmental process—one in which we humans are in the process of articulating and reaching for ever higher degrees of goodness, truth and beauty, to cite the classical virtues—then I believe the task that lies ahead can be accomplished. As Andrew emphasized, the German people have a unique opportunity to show the world that transformation is possible and to model on a collective level what it means for a culture to take responsibility for its past and forge a new and higher expression of humanity. As someone who has directly benefitted from so much that is exemplary in German culture—its great literature, music, art and philosophy, to name just a few— I think that they, and all of us, are up to the task.

So the fact that these public conversations are beginning to take place is very significant. If we don’t confront the truth, however horrific it may be, we are destined to act out of it in unconscious ways. I personally felt a lot was uncovered on Saturday. But the real work remains.

The full and challenging day was brought to an uplifting, joyful close with the gorgeous music by the Israeli singer and pianist Assaf Amdursky and his accompanying bassist.

Breaking the silence and finding the courage to begin addressing this difficult history, which has had such an enormous impact on Western culture and civilization and the lives of all of us today, has not been and will not be an easy task.

I know the whole world will benefit enormously if they bravely take the next step.