The reviving of the “Syria-Chaldaic” branch of the Roman Catholic Church is proposed as a means of solving the Jewish problem in Poland, by the Athenaeum Kaplanske, organ of the Catholic clergy in Poland.
The periodical sees in the “Jewish Christians,” i.e., baptized Jews, the group to act as pioneers for the realization of such a plan. The German methods of solving the Jewish problem it regards as utterly impracticable and as un-Christian.
“At present,” it writes, “the Jewish and the Christian communities have nothing in common and perhaps don’t desire to have anything in common. The only group that would be able to bridge the gulf between these two communities are the ‘Jewish Christians’. But at present this group is neither organized, nor does it want to retain anything Jewish. As soon as they leave the old faith, they strive very hard to separate themselves entirely from the Jewish people and to assimilate themselves with their non-Jewish surroundings. This is why the baptized Jews are liked by neither Jews nor Christians.
“The reason why only a few Jews ambrace Christianity,” the paper goes on, “is not because Jews are anxious to uphold their religion, but because of an hypertropic-Jewish nationalism which finds its expression in Zionism. To counteract the influence of Zionism, it would be necessary to organize the ‘Jewish Christians.’
“The Jews have already played a role by spreading Christianity, but that was during the first centuries of the Christian era. The new Jewish promoters of Christianity ought not to lose their identity, but, on the contrary, should form a quite separate branch of the Church, the ‘Syria-Chaldaic Church.’ This ‘Jewish’ branch of the Catholic Church should then become the organism which in the end should absorb all Jews, and thus solve the Jewish problem… at least in Poland. This Church, of course, would have its own clergy, of Jewish descent, as non-Jewish Catholic clergymen are not able to understand the Jewish nationality.”
“Such a solution,” the Athaeneum Kaplanske concludes, “should induce the Jews to flock to Christianity, for the embracing of Catholicism would not force them to separate themselves from the Jewish people. All this, however, would not eliminate the most burning Jewish question in Poland, namely, the economic plight of the Jews, but would, nevertheless, mean a great step forward in this direction.”
The paper winds up with a warning to take the matter in hand without any delay, as any procrastination would lessen the chances for the ultimate success of this plan of solving the Jewish problem.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
