last week in the weekly column of john allen jr posted on the national catholic reporter conversation cafe, he interviewed cardinal francis george from chicago. one of the highlights allen notes from the discussion that took place on the second of october was:
"George said the American bishops have asked for clarification from the Vatican as to whether the pre-Vatican II rite can be used during Holy Week, a question made acute by a controversial Good Friday prayer for the conversion of the Jews; If the old rite can be used in Holy Week, George said, a more positive prayer for the Jews from the new liturgy will "probably" be substituted for the old one - though at the same time, George said, this discussion could also be an occasion to ask Jews to renounce unflattering depictions of Jesus in the Talmud"
actual excerpts from the interview follow, which you may read here. they include some discussion of the recent broadening of permission the pope has given for the celebration of the pre-vatican ii latin mass. this includes the liturgy for good friday which has a prayer in it calling for the conversion of the jews. the part of the cardinal's response that stands out for me is this:
"Of course it can be done (changing the text of the prayer), and I suspect it probably will be, because the intention is to be sure that our prayers are not offensive to the Jewish people who are our ancestors in the faith. We can't possibly insult them in our liturgy … Not that any group has a veto on anybody's prayers, because you can go through Jewish texts and find material that is offensive to us. But if we're interested in keeping the dialogue strong, and we have to be, we should be very cautious about any prayer that they find insulting. 'They,' however, is a big tent. What my Jewish rabbi friend down the block finds insulting is different from what Abraham Foxman [national director of the Anti-Defamation League] finds insulting. Also, it does work both ways. Maybe this is an opening to say, 'Would you care to look at some of the Talmudic literature's description of Jesus as a bastard, and so on, and maybe make a few changes in some of that?'"
apples and oranges for me. in the cause of interfaith relations, there may be a place for some discussion of jewish terms for jesus in the talmud. however, those passages in the talmud are not public prayers that are part of the liturgy of a worship service. we do not sit in synagogue and refer to jesus as a bastard. in fact, if it were not for the unfortunate history between our two faith traditions, we would not refer to jesus at all since he is utterly irrelevant to either our theology or our philosophy. so i think the cardinal's response is a bit disingenuous. it tries to shift the focus of the issue away from the public catholic religious practice of a particular prayer that denies the jewish people the right to their own identity.
then there is the lovely headline in today's telegraph: Call for Jews to stop calling Jesus a bastard. hmmmmm.
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