Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) - Everyone is aware of the recent polemic which followed the liberalisation of the old Catholic rite, due to the re-use of the Good Friday prayer Oremus et pro Iudaeis and changes in the prayer's liturgical text. Presented by Benedict XVI in his Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum, the new formula in Latin was harshly criticised by European rabbis; less hard instead the positions of American rabbis, including the stance taken by Jacob Neusner.
The Holy See, precisely to make clear its position on the matter, issued a statement through the Holy See Press Office on 4 April in which it affirmed: “ Following the publication of the new Prayer for the Jews for the 1962 edition of the Roman Missal, some groups within the Jewish community have expressed disappointment that it is not in harmony with the official declarations and statements of the Holy See regarding the Jewish people and their faith which have marked the progress of friendly relations between the Jews and the Catholic Church over the last forty years.
The Holy See wishes to reassure that the new formulation of the Prayer, which modifies certain expressions of the 1962 Missal, in no way intends to indicate a change in the Catholic Church's regard for the Jews which has evolved from the basis of the Second Vatican Council, particularly the Declaration Nostra Aetate. In fact, Pope Benedict XVI, in an audience with the Chief Rabbis of Israel on 15 September 2005, remarked that this document "has proven to be a milestone on the road towards the reconciliation of Christians with the Jewish people." The continuation of the position found in Nostra Aetate is clearly shown by the fact that the prayer contained in the 1970 Missal continues to be in full use, and is the ordinary form of the prayer of Catholics.
In the context of other affirmations of the Council - on Sacred Scripture (Dei Verbum, 14) and on the Church (Lumen Gentium, 16) - Nostra Aetate presents the fundamental principles which have sustained and today continue to sustain the bonds of esteem, dialogue, love, solidarity and collaboration between Catholics and Jews. It is precisely while examining the mystery of the Church that Nostra Aetate recalls the unique bond with which the people of the New Testament is spiritually linked with the stock of Abraham and rejects every attitude of contempt or discrimination against Jews, firmly repudiating any kind of anti-Semitism."
On the occasion of Benedict XVI's apostolic visit to the United States, the cited document was a “pre-text” to the visit the Pope was due to make to New York's East Park Synagogue a few hours before the Jewish Easter. The Synagogue is presided by Rabbi Arthur Schneier who has been involved in interreligious dialogue with Christians and Muslims for some time. A visit which the Pope promised to make two years ago.
A meeting which was confirmed and which saw for the first time a Roman Pontiff cross the threshold of an American synagogue. Welcomed with songs of praise a cries of Shalom, the Pope met Austrian born Rabbi Schneier, a survivor of the Holocaust and the founder of an association for dialogue between Jews, Christians and Muslims.
"It is with joy that I come here, - said Benedict XVI - just a few hours before the celebration of your Pesah, to express my respect and esteem for the Jewish community in New York City…I assure you most especially of my closeness at this time, as you prepare to celebrate the great deeds of the Almighty, and to sing the praises of Him who has worked such wonders for his people. - Pope Ratzinger continued -I know that the Jewish community make a valuable contribution to the life of the city, and I encourage all of you to continue building bridges of friendship with all the many different ethnic and religious groups present in your neighborhood."
Remarking on the happy coinciding of his visit with the eve of Jewish Easter, new relations between Jews and Christians since Nostra aetate, which traces a parallel between Christian and Jewish Easter, between the death and resurrection of Jesus and the feast which recalls the liberation of the Jewish people from Egypt, the Pope said " Our Easter and your Pesah, while distinct and different, unite us in our common hope centered on God and his mercy. They urge us to cooperate with each other and with all men and women of goodwill to make this a better world for all as we await the fulfilment of God’s promises..”.
In word and deed then, Benedict XVI expressed sentiments of trust and friendship towards the Jewish community in America: “ In addressing myself to you I wish to re-affirm the Second Vatican Council’s teaching on Catholic-Jewish relations and reiterate the Church’s commitment to the dialogue that in the past forty years has fundamentally changed our relationship for the better” the Pope said in his message to the Jewish Community on the occasion of Pesah.
So has peace between the elder and the younger brothers been made? For Abraham Foxman, national director and chairman the Anti-defamation League of America, and for most of American Judaism, the press statement on 4 April explained something but not everything: “The good news - said Foxman - is that the Vatican replied, the bad news is that the answer is incomplete. It is as if it had taken two steps forward and three steps back, it has corrected the offensive language, but the text (the Latin formula in the old Rite) still gives the impression that the Church hopes for the conversion of the Jews. And this is contrary to the spirit of the Nostra aetate document and the spirit of the visit to the Synagogue”. Having said this however, Foxman ended his intervention on a note of hope: “We believe it is necessary to continue dialogue and see if it is possible to return not only to the spirit, but also to the language of Nostra aetate, which rejects any kind of proselytising with regard to the Jews. We must continue to work on the Vatican to convince it that more corrections are needed. Pope Ratzinger has already shown that he is ready to listen. I met the Pontiff twice last year and saw a man determined to fight anti-Semitism, and I did not have the impression that he is rigid, indeed quite the contrary. He is a person who listens ”. (6 - to be continued) (Agenzia Fides 25/4/2008; righe 74, parole 1.042)
