Ecumenism: What Catholics Think About Jews

A broad spectrum of Roman Catholic opinion holds that the Vatican Council must make a pronouncement on its relationship to Judaism. German bishops, aware that Catholic references to "perfidious Jews" encouraged Nazi antiSemitism, strongly support the proposal. So do U.S. bishops, who are eager for their church to speak out on matters that concern harmony in a pluralistic society. Last fall's session of the council received a draft proposal that Jews found pleasing, but never got around to debating it. Since then the proposal has been rewritten—and weakened so much that when...