200 Clerics Pledge Sermons on Holocaust : Religion: Christian group founded by Jewish businessman promises to preach against anti-Semitism.

Inspired by a Jewish businessman from Burbank, nearly 200 Christian clergymen from throughout Southern California pledged Saturday to preach against the dangers of anti-Semitism and to give at least one sermon a year on the Holocaust.

“We have a moral obligation to make sure it never happens again,” said the Rev. R.L. Hymers Jr., pastor of the Fundamentalist Baptist Tabernacle of Hope in downtown Los Angeles and a member of the Committee of Concerned Christians.

The group was formed by Ben Friedman, who last year sent letters to 2,000 U.S. clergy members, asking them to promise to deliver one sermon a year on the Holocaust or anti-Semitism.

“I got back 420 responses,” said Friedman, 67. “It was a wonderful experience for me as a Jewish man. It made a grown man cry.”

Saturday was the first meeting of the group--a luncheon in Studio City that featured the Richard C. Halverson, chaplain of the U.S. Senate. About 200 lay people representing various churches also attended. The group is dedicated to combatting anti-Semitism and various speakers told how they were battling bigotry in their congregations.

Hymers and several clergy members mentioned a report released this month by the Anti-Defamation League reporting an increase in anti-Semitic incidents in the United States for the fifth consecutive year. The report, released Feb. 6, said there were 1,897 reports of anti-Semitic incidents nationwide, an 11% increase over 1990.

Sam Zelkowicz, 67, a concentration camp survivor living in Ladera Heights who addressed the group, said afterward that the event “restored my faith in humanity” and gave him hope that the Holocaust he experienced in Poland might never be repeated.

“The next scapegoat might not be Jews. It might be blacks. It might be Koreans. It might be Japanese. Hate has many forms,” Zelkowicz said. “But we’re all children of God. We may not agree on how to worship him, but maybe we’ll learn to live together.”