Rabbi Rosen: Pope's Words Reaffirmation of Commitment to Dialogue

(20 Jan 10 - RV) On Wednesday the Bilateral Commission of the Holy See and the Chief Rabbinate of Israel issued a statement at the end of their ninth meeting, held Jan 17-20, at the Vatican.


The statement begins by recalling Pope Benedict XVI’s historic visit to Rome’s Synagogue on Sunday, where the Pope categorically reaffirmed the commitment of the Catholic Church to dialogue and fraternity with the Jewish People, as well as unequivocally condemning anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism.


One of the participants in the meetings, Rabbi David Rosen discussed with us the significance of the 9^th meeting’s having taken place in the context of Pope Benedict’s historic visit to the Synagogue of Rome this past Sunday, as well as other highlights of the most recent round of talks:
“One is to emphasise the historic significance for us of the Papal Synagogue in Rome, which, both in itself and in his words was a very dramatic reaffirmation of the commitment of the Catholic Church to its dialogue and collaboration with the Jewish people and hopefully putting to rest at least those who are open to persuasion that Pope Benedict is in no way less committed than his predecessor to this”.

 
“The second point is of course that why this takes place against the joy and excitement of that event it also takes place in the shadow of the tragedy of Haiti and we wanted to show our solidarity with the wounded and prayers for the victims and survivors”.