On The Other Hand
Editor — exploring modern JewryA Message To Catholics
The latest flare-up in Catholic-Jewish ties was an unexpected one. That’s because I’ve met too many bright, well-intentioned Catholic theologians along the way to think that their official body could take such a dangerous step backwards in the fragile Catholic-Jewish rapprochement, which after about 1,900 years of bad blood – often spilt blood at that—began in earnest less than five decades ago.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops appears – according to the Anti-Defamation League – to have given a “green light” for the missionizing of Jews. And it certainly seems that way.
The twist comes in a document called “A Note on Ambiguities Contained in Covenant and Mission,” which says that interfaith dialogue with Jews (and others) is a prime opportunity to spread the good word of the Catholic faith. The document was jointly released on June 18 by the USCCB Committee on Doctrine and Pastoral Practice and the Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs.
This seems to overturn a 2002 statement in “Reflection On Covenant and Mission.” In that text, interfaith dialogue was called “a mutually enriching sharing of gifts devoid of any intention whatsoever to invite the dialogue partner to baptism.”
Now there’s a weird thing about all this that Jews often forget; Christians are supposed to evangelize, and a whole branch of Christiandom, which happens to be the spiritual home of some 60 to 70 million Americans, is known as Evangelical Christianity. So let’s not criticize Christians for spreading the good word in general, but let’s hold them accountable for the context in particular.
After all, the very sordid history between Christians and Jews has seen Jews numerically and often physically overwhelmed since the first century C.E. Further, in Europe this led to Jews living precariously amidst Christian xenophobia, slander and outright slaughters, all of which I believe in part – not in entirety – laid the groundwork for the Holocaust. So it’s more than fair to say that the Catholic Church needs to back off here.
We have a gargantuan amount of work to do together to make life on God’s good [and not green enough] earth better, something which will take many centuries because we didn’t arrive at this mess yesterday. Indeed, our fractured world – to borrow a phrase from the late Emil Fackenheim (who took it from kaballah) –needs immediate attention from our spiritual leadership, which means we don’t need stupid distractions.
Maybe after we relieve all of the poverty, hunger, educational inequalities, racism and other hatreds that lead to such insanity, maybe then we can worry about whose theology trumpets whose. And maybe then God will even send us a text message weighing in.
Until then, let’s cut the narrishkeit. (Note to Catholic friends: It’s Yiddish; look it up. After all, I have to look up your Latin phrases.)
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 06/26/09 at 10:27 AM | Comments (2)
