Pope Benedict XVI will visit the monument to Austrian victims of the Holocaust in Vienna.
The German-born pope is slated to make a five-minue stop at the monument in the Judenplatz, or Jewish Square, on the first day of his official visit to Austria Sept. 7-10, the Vatican announced. The pope will move on to the Vatican’s diplomatic mission before meeting with Austrian President Heinz Fischer.
Benedict visited the former Nazi death camp of Auschwitz in Poland in May 2006. He later was criticized by Jewish leaders for not having spoken out more against anti-Semitism during his visit – an omission he sought to correct in a Mass a week later in Rome.
The Judenplatz Holocaust Memorial,also known as the Nameless Library, was designed by the British artist Rachel Whiterhead to commemorate the more than 65,000 Austrian Jews murdered during the Holocaust. Erected in 2000, the memorial is an austere concete cube intended to resemble libary shelves turned inside out.
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