New York, NY, September 16, 2011 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) urges the Vatican to ensure that a breakaway Catholic sect which teaches anti-Judaism will be required to accept the church's official positive teachings about Jews and Judaism before they are fully accepted back into the Roman Catholic Church.
The Vatican announced earlier this week that in order for The Society of St. Pius X to gain full reconciliation with the church, SSPX must accept some core church teachings, but they have not been made public.
It was unclear from news reports and Vatican statements whether the landmark reforms of the Second Vatican Council and subsequent Vatican teachings - which reversed nearly 2,000 years of church-based anti-Semitism, repudiated the deicide charge against Jews, and called for positive and respectful interfaith relations - were included among these latest requirements.
Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director and a Holocaust survivor, issued the following statement:
We are confident that Pope Benedict XVI will continue to require the Society of St. Pius X, which espouses anti-Semitic and anti-Jewish beliefs, to publicly accept the church's positive teachings about Jews and Judaism since the 1965 Second Vatican Council, before fully accepting them back into the Roman Catholic Church.
It would be unthinkable to allow a Catholic breakaway sect that includes a Holocaust-denying bishop, Richard Williamson, to be reintegrated into the church while still being allowed to promote anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism - which they have been doing for years in their teachings and on their Web site.
We trust Pope Benedict's promise that he made to us during our meeting in 2007 that he would stand with us against all forms of anti-Semitism.