This is a thorny issue but we would do well to remember the Dutch example. In 1943,or 42 the Dutch bishops ordered a pastroal letter to be read from all church pulpits condemning Nazi racism against the Jews. They were ordered by the Gestapo to be silent. They were not. As a result those "non-Aryan" Dutch Catholics were deported, after having been, perhaps temporarily exempted. The condemnation by the hierarchy certainly did nothing to stop the deportations of Dutch Jewry whoch was decimated.
The same Jewish groups demanded that the canonisation of St. Benedicta of the Cross, aka Edith Stein, who with her sister Rosa were gassed at Aushwitz be stopped. These protests are to be expected but are not helpful to Catholic-Jewish relations. |
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