The American Catholic Bishops have already formed a “subcommission for Jewish Affairs” in anticipation of favorable action by the Ecumenical Council on the declaration on Catholic-Jewish relations, a Catholic observer at the Ecumenical Council has reported.
The disclosure was made in the current issue of Harpers Magazine by F.E. Cartus, described in the magazine as “the pseudonym of a Roman Catholic observer who has watched developments in the Vatican Council.” He said that the subcommission was a unit of a “Commission for Ecumenical Affairs,” and that the bishops had already held one meeting with representatives of the American Episcopal Church.
Mr. Cartus also asserted that the draft declaration on Jews had been “subjected to a severs revision” by June of this year. He did not detail the nature of the alleged revisions in the draft which is understood, in the version now before the fourth Council session, to denounce anti-Semitism and to repudiate the charge of deicide against Jews, past and present, in the crucifixion of Jesus. It has been reported that, since the fourth session opened on September 14, one of the amendments proposed to the draft drops the word “deicide” but retains the original meaning of the draft.
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