A California organization of Holocaust survivors that is affiliated with Chapman University and is a benefactor of the University of California says its members would be more than happy to educate the actor Mel Gibson about the horrors of the Nazi genocide against the Jews of Europe.

Mr. Gibson, who apologized this week for his anti-Semitic rantings to the police officer who arrested him for drunken driving last Friday, has said he is seeking help from those he has offended by his comments. William Elperin, president of the 1939 Club, said in a news release that his organization welcomed the opportunity to “educate him about what it is like to be a Jew both in an anti-Semitic and free society.”

The 1939 Club, named for the year in which the Nazis invaded Poland, supports a lecture series and other Holocaust-education programs at Chapman. The organization also has supported Holocaust-education programs at other universities, and 20 years ago it created the 1939 Club Chair in Holocaust Studies at the University of California at Los Angeles, the first such chair at a public university.