Breaking: Israel's chief rabbinate severs Vatican ties

[Mrs. Sharon B. Hodge]

Breaking: Israel's chief rabbinate severs Vatican ties
by Thomas Peters


This is a complicated story, but the latest development has become especially noteworthy:

Israel's chief rabbinate severed ties with the Vatican on Wednesday to protest a papal decision to reinstate a bishop who publicly denied 6 million Jews were killed during the Holocaust.

The Jewish state's highest religious authority sent a letter to the Holy See expressing "sorrow and pain" at the papal decision. "It will be very difficult for the chief rabbinate of Israel to continue its dialogue with the Vatican as before," the letter said. Chief rabbis of both the Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews were parties to the letter.

The rabbinate, which faxed a copy of the letter to The Associated Press, also canceled a meeting with the Vatican set for March. The rabbinate and the state of Israel have separate ties with the Vatican, and Wednesday's move does not affect state relations.

Pope Benedict XVI, faced with an uproar over the bishop, said Wednesday he feels "full and indisputable solidarity" with Jews and warned against any denial of the full horror of the Nazi genocide.

The remarks were his first public comments on the issue since the controversy erupted Saturday. (AP)

Obviously there are many layers here, many different things going on at once.

I tend to dislike jumping into stories in "real-time" when there is a significant chance that a little more time will clarify the situation. In the meantime, I've been reading a lot of coverage which I'll quickly summarize from memory:

*the disputed Swedish TV interview, it appears, was conducted without the knowledge of the Holy See, so there's very little chance the excommunication-lifting announcement went forward with a knowledge that such an incendiary episode had recently taken place
*the relationship between the Holy See and the four bishops in question is not directly a Jewish-Christian dispute, but the comments in question have overflowed into it
*Bp. Bernard Fellay, the Superior General of the SSPX, has attempted to gag the offending Bp. Richard Williamson after his anti-semitic comments were made public. The SSPX is now faced internally with a very important decision as to which side they take in the debate
*My gut reaction is to say that Israel's Rabbis are not handling this affair well, and that Pope Benedict is doing his very best to save a situation complicated by disadvantaged intel

Hopefully that sheds some light on the situation.

(oh, and for those who are interested in the original question regarding the ins-and-outs of the original lifting of the excommunications, see Ed Peters' comprehensive treatment of the variables.)

Papists - please populate the comment box with thoughtful comments and links to informed opinion.

I'll be watching this story as it develops.