Posted on 05/24/2014 9:26:50 AM PDT by IsraelBeach
Israel Welcomes Pope Francis
By Joel Leyden
Israel News Agency
Jerusalem --- May 24 ... Within 24 hours, the fourth Pope to visit Israel will arrive in the Holy Land.
Pope Francis is under no obligation to visit Jordan, Israel and the Palestinians. He is not running for office. He is not closing a business deal. Nor is he seeking to find a cheaper source of gas for the Vatican from the newly discovered gas and oil fields off the shores of Israel.
The Catholic church was not always welcoming of Jews and of Israel.
For centuries, Jews were portrayed as the rejecters of Christ, “perfidious” objects of contempt to be isolated and humiliated until they “saw the light,” a non-people shorn of their covenantal heritage including the ancient and biblical right to the Land of Israel.
Inquisition, blood libel, pogrom, burning of the Talmud and burning Jews at the stake, ghettoization and the Holocaust – these were the fruits of 2,000 years of vicious Christian anti-Semitism.
In our generation, one Pope was complicity silent throughout the Holocaust. Another Pope warmly embraced Egyptian born Yasser Arafat way back in 1982 when no one else would go near the terrorist mastermind. It took until 1993 for the Vatican to establish diplomatic recognition to the State of Israel.
But Pope Francis is a different Pope offering different solutions to a 2014 Middle East.
He comes to the Middle East, not as a politician but rather as a pilgrim on a religious journey. Pope Francis comes to Israel with deep respect for the Jewish religion, for Muslims and the poor.
In Jordan today, he spoke out against the violence in Syria, where over 100,000 civilians have been murdered by President Assad. He will then take a helicopter to Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christ. There he is expected to embrace himself in deep prayer. He may call for a Palestinian state but this must be balanced with a call for Palestinians to recognize the Jewish state of Israel.
The Pope, who is truly a man of peace, should also address Islamic Jihad - whose sole purpose is to convert or murder every Jew and Christian.
Pope Francis before leaving for Bethlehem needs to make a plea to end the Palestinian incitement against Jews. That propaganda posters that portray Israeli soldiers kicking and beating Jesus Christ be removed from every wall. If the Pope truly wants to create bridges of understanding and peace - he must confront the seeds of hatred presently being taught by Palestinian Arabs, the Palestinian Authority to their children.
He must say to Palestinian leaders: "Don't try to play divide and conquer between the Jews and the Catholics and Christians."
Pope Francis will visit the Western Wall, will lay a wreath on the tomb of Theodor Herzl and walk through the Holocaust museum of Yad Veshem in Jerusalem. He will show deep respect for the global Jewish community. And Rabbi Avraham Skorka head of the Latin American Rabbinical Seminary of the Conservative Movement in Buenos Aires, who is accompanying the Pope to Israel, will make certain that there are no cultural mistakes.
Rabbi Skorka and Pope Francis are long term friends. Close friends who deeply trust one another. They both embrace and practice interfaith dialogue, creating bridges of understanding and respect. It is up to these two men to openly request of the PA and of the Muslim community to stop hatred and incitement against the Jewish community.
Israel Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu recently said that the prevalence of anti-Semitism in the West Bank, as noted in the Anti-Defamation League's global survey of the phenomenon released last week, is the direct result of the Palestinian leadership's incitement.
Ranking anti-Semitic sentiments by region, the ADL determined that the most anti-Semitic regions were found to be the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Palestinian anti-Semitism is “pervasive throughout society,” the ADL found, with 93% of respondents affirming anti-Jewish stereotypes.
When President Ronald Reagan visited Berlin in 1987 and demanded of the Soviet Union to "tear down this wall" - it is now up to Pope Francis to state "tear down the hate".
Israel warmly welcomes Pope Francis to Israel. We invite you, the reader to join us on Facebook to show your support. He is a good friend. He is an ally.
Both Catholics and Jews face a common enemy. If the Pope does not address Islamic Jihad and it's intolerance of "infidels" - Jews and Christians - he will have missed a potent opportunity.
The Pope is now going to visit the only democracy in the Middle East.
Israel which practices freedom of religion and freedom of speech. Let's pray that the Pope speaks out against Islamic hatred and intolerance.
He will not be able to state such words in any other nation in that region.
Joel Leyden is a respected journalist and international media consultant who has lived in the Middle East for over 25 years. Leyden has served as a senior consultant to the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs and has assisted Israel in the development and use of digital media.
Stopped reading. Anyone who tries to lay the blame for the Holocaust on Christianity has my comtempt.
How many people, outside of those actually close to the concentration camps, actually knew what exactly was going on? The Nazis were brutally efficient, and circulated a lot of misinformation to muddy the waters. And remember, although Jews were the single largest group of victims of the Holocaust, they accounted for less than half of the total.
This another libelous anti-Catholic attack ... Thanks to the Catholic Church and the “silent” Pope, Pius XII, more than 800,000 Jews were saved from the Nazi extermination camps.
While the American Jews were not able to get FDR to open the doors of U.S. to the fleeing Jews and when the British closed the doors of Palestine to the Jews escaping Nazi occupied Europe, Pius XII ordered the churches, convents, seminaries and even the Vatican to hide the Jews. Tens of thousands of Jews were provided false baptism certificates to emigrate to South American where several countries were in a joint effort with the Vatican to save the Jews.
Even the Spanish dictator, Francisco Franco recognized as Spanish citizens the descendants of the Sephardic Jews that were expelled from Spain in 1492 by order of the Catholic Kings, Fernando and Isabella. Thanks to Franco more than 60,000 Jews saved their lives, this is quite a contrast with the less than 10,000 received by FDR
“Israel Welcomes Pope Francis”
aka Jacob welcomes Esau.
Holocaust museum praised for corrections to Pius XII exhibit
cna ^ | July 5, 2012 | Benjamin Mann
Jerusalem, Israel, Jul 5, 2012 / 03:38 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial has made changes to a controversial exhibit on Pope Pius XII, presenting a more balanced view of his actions toward the Nazis and their Jewish victims.
Pave the Way Foundation President Gary Krupp, a prominent Jewish defender of Pope Pius XII, said his inter-religious group was “very pleased” with Yad Vashem’s change of position, which “should show the world that it is truly an institution based on facts and truth.”
“The black legend against Pope Pius XII is being bleached white by the stark light of truth,” Krupp told CNA on July 5. Further research, he said, will show that the Pope, born Eugenio Pacelli, “was indeed a great hero to the Jewish people during our darkest years of the Shoah.”
Yad Vashem’s new wall panel on Pius XII and the Vatican “presents a more complex picture than previously presented,” the museum said in a July 1 announcement, citing “research that has been done in the recent years” on the wartime Pope.
The panel’s revised text states that “reaction of Pius XII, Eugenio Pacelli, to the murder of the Jews during the Holocaust is a matter of controversy among scholars.” It acknowledges the Pope’s condemnation of ethnic persecutions, as well as the Holy See’s efforts to save Jews...
“The black legend against Pope Pius XII is being bleached white by the stark light of truth,” Krupp told CNA on July 5. Further research, he said, will show that the Pope, born Eugenio Pacelli, “was indeed a great hero to the Jewish people during our darkest years of the Shoah.”
The above is also excerpted from the linked article. A reasonable person could conclude that the exclusion of this exculpatory crux of the article is intentional and even expected from someone who has maintained an unwarranted vendetta against the Church. The fact that the accusations against Pope Pius XII originated within the Kremlin for cold war propaganda purposes shed light on your presumed motives.
The whole “Hitler’s Pope” tale is a KGB disinformation operation. The highest ranking East bloc intelligence agent ever to defect to the West, Ion Mihi Pacepa, who himself participated in the operation, says so. Pacepa even reports the detail that Andropov regretted the operation to him after learning of Hitler’s plans to arrest or kill Pius XII.
Put that together with the overwhelmingly favorable testimony of people who actually lived through the events in question — like the chief rabbi of Rome, Angelo Roncalli (later Pope John XXIII), Golda Meir, Pinchas Lapide, etc. — and it’s clear that “Hitler’s Pope” is a dirty slander.
The whole article.
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/holocaust-museum-praised-for-corrections-to-pius-xii-exhibit/
Martin Luther laid the blueprint down for the Holocaust.
http://www.harrington-sites.com/Luther.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_and_antisemitism
And who set up the Rat Line for many Nazis to escape? The Vatican.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratlines_%28World_War_II_aftermath%29
The origins of the first ratlines are connected to various developments in Vatican-Argentine relations before and during World War II.[2] As early as 1942, Monsignor Luigi Maglione contacted Ambassador Llobet, inquiring as to the “willingness of the government of the Argentine Republic to apply its immigration law generously, in order to encourage at the opportune moment European Catholic immigrants to seek the necessary land and capital in our country”.[3] Afterwards, a German priest, Anton Weber, the head of the Rome-based Society of Saint Raphael, traveled to Portugal, continuing to Argentina, to lay the groundwork for future Catholic immigration; this was to be a route which fascist exiles would exploit - without the knowledge of the Catholic Church.[3] According to historian Michael Phayer, “this was the innocent origin of what would become the Vatican ratline”.[3]
Keep in mind that ancient Rome was set up by Jacob’s twin brother, Esau when he left Edom and traveled West which was then known as Chittim.
The Nazis are descended from Amalek, one of five grandchildren of Esau.
And what was Esau? A wealthy hunter!
And beyond that, many countries were helping "useful" nazis escape, not least of which, the United States.
There's much to object to in this frantically slanted article, but this is the one I had to respond to.
This Free Republic post about Pope Pius XII (LINK) well-summarizes the huge cache of evidence which proves that Pius XII was early, active and effective in opposing the Nazis and saving endangered Jews from their clutches.
One of Pius’ former enemies, Gary Krupp, knows. He researched the history and was converted by the facts. He put it this way, “Through our research of documented proof, we have discovered that secretly, he saved more Jews than all of the world’s religious and political leaders combined.”
Here's a source for Gary Krupp, now one of Pope Pius XII's most vocal Jewish defenders (LINK).
Read and learn.
Plausible deniability.
Esau is always willing to help out his grandchildren, even Amalek, who just happens to be the worst enemy of Israel since right after the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai some 3,000 years ago.
This is based on some pretty tenuous stretches of a handful of bible passages, and has no basis in historical reality.
I trust the rabbis on this. They are usually much more correct than incorrect.
Christians would stand by railway tracks taking their index finger as like a knife to their throats to tell the Jews where they were going. My grandparents were murdered by the Nazis. When going to their local church they were told that there was nothing they could do.
There were some righteous gentiles who hid Jews risking their own lives. The Anne Frank story and Schindler's List illustrates this. So does the family in Poland that took in my step-mother and gave her a cross to wear. That cross saved her life. But the majority were silent. They smelled human flesh burning from the ovens of dozens of death camps and did nothing. Don't take my word for this - go here: German, Polish civilians forced by US Army to witness Holocaust victims
This is just one photo from hundreds.
Pope Francis is a good man. Israel warmly welcomes him with open arms. Catholics, Jews and Christians face a common enemy today - Islamic Jihad.
Let us not allow our enemies to play divide and conquer among us. ;>
In Jordan today, he spoke out against the violence in Syria, where over 100,000 civilians have been murdered by President Assad. He will then take a helicopter to Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christ. There he is expected to embrace himself in deep prayer... The Pope, who is truly a man of peace, should also address Islamic Jihad - whose sole purpose is to convert or murder every Jew and Christian... Pope Francis will visit the Western Wall, will lay a wreath on the tomb of Theodor Herzl and walk through the Holocaust museum of Yad Veshem in Jerusalem. He will show deep respect for the global Jewish community. And Rabbi Avraham Skorka head of the Latin American Rabbinical Seminary of the Conservative Movement in Buenos Aires, who is accompanying the Pope to Israel, will make certain that there are no cultural mistakes. Rabbi Skorka and Pope Francis are long term friends.
Thanks IsraelBeach, well said.
In other words, Christians who responded with heroic self-sacrifice, were those most observant, most representative of a deeply Christian ethic and influence.
What sparked my response here, was this author Joel Layden's lazy and vicious slander against Pope Pius XII. This is "blood libel" played back at innocent, even heroic Christians.
By now I hope you are more aware of how this "blood libel" works.
In 1928 the Holy Office had already condemned anti-Semitism. On September 6, 1938, Pius XI told a group of Belgian pilgrims: “Through Christ and in Christ, we are spiritual descendants of Abraham.” Incontrovertible facts prove the extraordinary efforts that Pius XI, Pius XII, and the Catholic Church made in saving the Jews during the Holocaust.
Before becoming Pope, and as early as 1935, Pius XII, Nazi German Regime in conversations with the French Ambassador to the Holy See, Charles-Roux, while the rest of the world were willingly accepting Hitler’s power grasp upon the German government. The Duke of Windsor visited Hitler and Lloyd George even went so far as to call him the “greatest living German”! In the U.S. there were also people in high positions who were openly sympathizers of Hitler, such as Henry Ford I, who was also a strong anti-Semitic.
On March 14, 1937, before it was fashionable to denounce the German Führer as a villain and long before the creation of the concentration camps and the gas chambers, Pius XI, ably seconded by his Secretary of State, wrote the Encyclical “Mit Brennender Sorge” meaning “with burning anxiety”. It dealt with the nazi threat to racial minorities and specifically the Jews addressing the Encyclical directly to the German people.
The Encyclical exhorted that Catholics must never be anti-Semitic because “we are all Semites spiritually” and ought to hold the Jewish people in high regard accordingly.
The Encyclical exposed to the world the III Reich’s persecution of the Catholic Church as well as the incompatibility between the principles of the National Socialism and those of the Catholic faith. The German government prohibited the entrance of the Encyclical to the country and it became necessary to smuggle it into Germany under the nose of the ruthless Gestapo. On Sunday March 21, The Encyclical was read from 12,000 Catholic pulpits across Germany. As a result, the Nazi’s campaign of innuendoes against The Church as well as the persecution of Catholics worsened.
Israeli senior diplomat and Orthodox Jewish Rabbi, Pinchas Lapide, with access to Yad Vashem’s archives, has stated in his book, “Three Popes and the Jews”, that “The Catholic Church relief and rescue program under the pontificate of Pius XII was instrumental in saving the lives of as many as 860,000 Jews from certain death at Nazi’s hands. That was more than all other Churches, religious institutions and international rescue organizations put together.” The Israelis recognized the lives saved by planting a forest, in commemoration, of as many trees in the Negeb, SE of Jerusalem. This forest was shown to Pope Paul VI during his first state visit to Israel.
At the end of the War, the World Jewish Congress, the American Jewish Committee, Albert Einstein, and many other prominent Jewish leaders expressed their deep gratitude toward Pius XII and the Catholic Church. On the death of Pius XII (1958), Golda Meir, the Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs, gave a heartfelt eulogy for the Pope before the UN Assembly.
In his scholar book, “The Last Three Popes and the Jews”, Lapide said that Pius XII was one of the few world leaders outside the Jewry itself who was quick to recognize the danger of Nazism. Lapide demonstrates convincingly the consistent and active protection provided to the Jews in Europe by the papacy. In Lapide’s words:
“When armed force ruled well-nigh omnipotent, and morality was at its lowest ebb, Pius XI commanded non of the former and could only appeal to the latter, in confronting with bare hands, the full might of evil. A sounding protest, which might turn out to be self-thwarting-or quiet piecemeal rescue? Loud words- or prudent deeds? The dilemma must have been sheer agony, for whichever course he chose horrible consequences were inevitable. Unable to cure the sickness of an entire civilization, and unwilling to bear the brunt of Hitler’s fury, the Pope, unlike many far mightier than he, alleviated, relieved, appealed, petitioned-and saved as most efficient he could by his own lights.
Who, but a prophet or a martyr could have done much more? The Talmud teaches us that ‘whoever preserves one life, it is accounted to him by Scripture as if he had preserved a whole world.’
If this is true-and it is as true as that of most Jewish of tenets, the sanctity of human life-then Pius XII deserves that forest in Judean hills, which kindly people of Israel proposed for him in October 1958. A memorial forest with 860,000 trees.” (Emphasis added. “Three Popes and the Jews.” pp.267-269)
On February 28, 1945, the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Isaac Herzog, sent a letter of gratitude to the Apostolic Nuncio in Rumania, Msgr. Andrea Cassulo, stating that: “The people of Israel will never forget what His Holiness and his illustrious delegates, inspired by the eternal principles of religion which form the very foundations of civilization, are doing for us unfortunate brothers and sisters in the most tragic hour of our history,
Rabbi Herzog’s heartfelt words should suffice to forever end the slanderous attacks to the memory of the great protector of the Jews, Pius XII and the Catholic Church.
In Poland, Catholics caught by the Nazis helping the Jews were condemned to death. As many non Jews, as Jews were killed by the Nazis at the extermination camps. Thousands of priests, religious and nuns, including Bishops, were sent to the concentration camps. Bishops were driven out, priests killed or imprisoned. Within a few years one third of the pre-war 2,000 priests were dead and 700 imprisoned; seminaries were closed, the Catholic press and voluntary associations suppressed. The Holy See found itself desperately fighting in two fronts, for the survival of the Jews and for the survival of his own flock. The Church in a beleaguered Poland was being bled to death by the two great scourges of humanity, the Nazis and Communists. In Poland three million Catholics went to their death along with three million Jews at the Nazi’s concentration camps in addition to the millions murdered by the Soviets.
Who is remembering them? Who are crying for their dead?
Unfortunately, there is plenty anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism even today. Certainly there was anti-Semitism at that time all around the world, but it was not mainly from Catholics and much less from the Catholic Church. Germany was not alone; there was plenty of anti-Semitism in the highest spheres of the Allied governments.
Jewish historian Richard Breitman has written five books, one on the Holocaust and another on Nazism. He is, up to this day, the only person authorized to study the OSS secret documents of U.S. espionage during WWII. The Italian newspaper “Corriere della Sera.” interviewed him on June 29, 2000. In the article, Breitman not only confirms the role played by Pius XII in defending and safeguarding the persecuted during the Nazi regime but he also found “the Allied silence on the Holocaust surprising. Their first testimonies are from the end of 1942…” He also remarked that the documents denoted how the Nazis considered that the Vatican was in the side of the Allies.
The reaction of the US, French and British governments at that time, and even later, when knowledge of the concentration camps existed, were certainly not in solidarity for the persecuted Jews. In the middle of the genocide, Britain closed the doors of Palestine to the Jews. The U.S. government accepted a total of 10,000-15,000 Jewish refugees throughout the war – a truly scandalous statistic.
Being Anti-Catholic is as evil as being anti-Semitic. No matter how overwhelming is the evidence that no other organization did more to save the Jews than the Catholic Church, Pius XII and the Catholics in general, the anti-Catholic bigots will continue to pour their venom.
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