Riegner Hails Catholic Document on Christian-jewish Relations

The French Roman Catholic document on Christian-Jewish relations issued last week was praised by Dr. Gerhart Riegner, Geneva, Secretary-General of the World Jewish Congress, as going beyond the 1965 Vatican II statement on Jews. Dr. Riegner stated that the French Episcopate declaration for the first time rejects the still remaining anti-Semitic teachings of the Church which they label as “pseudo-theology,” accepts the permanency of the Jewish people and its spiritual message, as well as its right to a “political existence” of its own.

He said that the document, titled “Pastoral Orientations on the Attitude of Christians Toward Judaism.” issued April 16 on the eve of the Jewish observance of Passover, “should become a milestone in Catholic-Jewish relations and serve as a model guideline for similar pronouncements by national Episcopates.” The French statement, according to Dr. Riegner, “does not limit itself, as Vatican II did, to exposing the spiritual links between Christianity and Judaism and their historical sources, but accepts the Jewish community as a living reality from whose spiritual message Christians still today can benefit.”

Dr. Riegner, who brought together current on-going working communications with the Vatican and the World Council of Churches through the International Jewish Committee on Inter-religious Consultations, viewed the French document as dramatizing “considerable progress in efforts we have made in dealing on the highest level with these major Christian church bodies.”

The International Jewish Committee consists of the World Jewish Congress, the Synagogue Council of America, the American Jewish Committee, the B’nai B’rith, and the Israel Jewish Council for Interreligious Contacts. Dr. Riegner has been in the United States on a three-week speaking tour, briefing Jewish leaders in various cities on a wide range of World Jewish Congress activities.