A Vatican group is asking Israel’s attorney general to indict the head of a far-right Jewish group who recently expressed approval for destroying churches in Israel. The Custody of the Holy Land, in a letter sent to Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein on Sunday, said that Rabbi Benzi Gopstein of the group Lehava poses a threat…
(Thomson Reuters Foundation) – It wasn’t an invitation she expected, but Canadian environmentalist Naomi Klein – a self-styled secular Jewish feminist – was happy to address Vatican officials after Pope Francis enlisted her for a campaign against climate change. Pope Francis, spiritual leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics, published a 192-page encyclical last…
The Vatican signed its first treaty with the “State of Palestine” on Friday, calling for “courageous decisions” to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with a two-state solution. The treaty concerned the Catholic Church’s activities in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority. The Israeli foreign ministry said it regretted the move, calling the signing of a treaty,…
Could a lengthy document, written in Latin and published after extensive theological debates, overturn centuries of animosity between the Catholic Church and the Jewish people? Closing the book on almost 2,000 years of persecution seemed nearly impossible when the Second Vatican Council adopted Nostra Aetate, the Catholic Church’s historic rejection of the notion that Jewish…
A Jew visiting Rome with the hope of finding some aspect of her heritage may be drawn to the synagogue on the banks of the Tiber River, or to wander through the ghetto, perhaps to sample carciofi alla Giudia, Jewish-style artichokes. She is unlikely to consider the Vatican to be a source of Jewish art….
(JTA) — When considering the Vatican’s creep toward recognition of Palestinian statehood, think “Israel-Vatican” and not “Jewish-Catholic,” say Jewish officials involved in dialogue with the church. A May 13 announcement on an agreement regarding the functioning of the church in areas under Palestinian control raised eyebrows in its reference to the “State of Palestine.” The…
Pope Francis meant no offense to Israel by referring to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas as being “an angel of peace” and intended to encourage harmony between the two sides, the Vatican said on Tuesday. Francis met Abbas at the Vatican on Saturday and used the words as he presented the Palestinian president with a large…
Last week, the Vatican edged close to formal recognition of a Palestinian state, finalizing a treaty in which for the first time, the Holy See makes explicit reference to a “state of Palestine.” Israel’s Foreign Ministry, while voicing disappointment at the move, was unusually circumspect in its initial response, stating that the use of the…
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