(JTA) — Pope John Paul II and Pope John XXIII, who played key roles in fostering Catholic-Jewish relations, will be canonized as saints.
The ceremony will take place on April 27, the Vatican announced Monday.
The Polish-born John Paul, who reigned from 1978 to 2005, made bettering Catholic-Jewish relations a cornerstone of his papacy.
John XXIII, the pontiff from 1958 to 1963, convened the Second Vatican Council, which in 1965 issued the Nostra Aetate declaration calling for Jewish-Catholic dialogue and rejecting the ancient Christian stigma against Jews as killers of Jesus.
The Vatican had said in July that the two late popes would be declared saints but had not set a date.
