BY GARY JONES
UJF JEWISH COMMUNITY RELATIONS COUNCIL DIRECTOR
As our JCRC members and those of you who read this monthly JCRC message know, one of our two newly formed subcommittees is focused specifically on developing and maintaining mutually supportive relationships with members of the interfaith and other racial and ethnic communities.
Today, I am writing to acknowledge and rejoice in the 60th anniversary of perhaps the most important action undertaken by any faith group in history to turn away from a very troubling past, recognize the importance of the Jewish community to that faith and even mandate meaningful and respectful dialogue with us.
On October 28, 1965, the Catholic Church, under the leadership of Pope Paul VI, issued Nostra aetate during the Second Vatican Council. Nostra aetate (Latin for “In our time”) was intended to provide a basis for respectful relationships with non-Christian faiths, but it is especially important and even revolutionary in its mandate to reform its relationship with the Jewish community.
In brief summary, Nostra aetate:
a) repudiated the deicide charge (which placed collective responsibility for the death of Christ on all Jews no matter when or where they lived),
b) acknowledged that Church teachings contributed to Antisemitism and the Holocaust,
c) recognized the Jewish role in the creation of Christianity, and
d) rejected the notion that Jews had been abandoned by G-d for rejecting Christ.
For nearly 2000 years, Jews bore the religiously motivated hatred of the religion that first dominated Europe and later the Americas and other parts of the world. The notion of collective responsibility for the death of Christ painted Jews as an evil conspiratorial collective mass that had no protection in G-d’s eyes and therefore deserved no protection from other people. It further gave credence to the notion that all Jews are equally responsible for the bad (real or perceived) actions of any Jew, including those events that had nothing to do with the deicide charge.
Church doctrine, therefore, paved the way for so many of the conspiracy theories that have haunted Jews for centuries, including the blood libel, the widely held belief that Jews were responsible for plagues and other catastrophes that affected Europe, and the Czarist forgery The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion. These conspiracies led to centuries of murder, forced expulsions, pogroms and fueled the Holocaust.
Even today, hateful Islamist nations and terrorist groups parrot these European conspiracy theories as partial justification for their commitment to destroy Israel and murder Jews everywhere. The Protocols is literally part of the Hamas Charter. Other Jew haters, including those on the right and left also adopt various, often inconsistent, conspiracy theories about Jewish control and evil intentions. The pattern that began 2000 years ago is not over.
However, we can and should be grateful that the Catholic Church has formally renounced its longstanding dangerous perspectives and has set an example for fostering respect and understanding. Here’s hoping that others follow the path that the Catholic church established on October 28, 1965.
In the meantime, it is our job as a Jewish community to continue to reach out to our neighbors and friends of all faiths to promote respect and understanding. As noted above, that is what we do at the JCRC. We could use your help. We need more volunteers to help build these relationships. Please be in touch if you are interested in helping us with this important and uplifting work.