The Pope

[Amadeus]

COLOGNE, Germany -- Pope Benedict XVI will on Friday become only the second Roman Catholic leader ever to visit a Jewish place of worship when he goes to the Cologne synagogue during his visit to Germany.

 

In visiting the synagogue, he is following in the footsteps of his predecessor John Paul II who made an historic visit to the Rome synagogue in 1986.

 

The highly symbolic gesture is in line with the new pope's determination to foster reconciliation between different faiths at a time of stresses and strains on all sides.

 

Source

 

COLOGNE, Germany For only the second time ever, a pope will visit a synagogue.

Pope Benedict is to address the oldest German Jewish community today in Cologne as part of his visit for the Catholic Church's World Youth Day.

 

The gathering will take place in a temple rebuilt in the 1950's after it was destroyed by the Nazis in 1938.

 

The visit follows in the footsteps of his predecessor, Pope John Paul, who made a historic 1986 visit to Rome's synagogue.

 

Benedict also will go to the "Hall of Memory," which recalls the six million victims of the Holocaust. He'll also say prayers and exchange gifts with a rabbi.

 

Source

 

Although I'm not very religious (in fact, I'm not religious at all - well, officially I'm still a protestant, but gave that up as I had to pay Church tax in Germany - one of the very few countries to levy such a tax, around £10 a month), I thought that this piece of news was worth mentioning..

 

It's only the second time ever that a pope visits a synagogue, and the first time he does so on a visit to a foreign country so historically, it is quite significant, I think...

 

Apart from the fact that the current Pope is from Germany (well, Bavaria, to be precise, the very same part of Germany I'm from), I do think that it's a good gesture towards communication and understanding between religions in today's world, were so many of our everyday news stories are based on the faith of the people involved.

 

From one of above news articles:

 

The meeting with Jewish leaders during the synagogue visit will be followed by talks with Muslim leaders on Saturday, signifying the pope's commitment to dialogue with other religions during a summer scarred by Islamic terrorist violence with bombings in London and Egypt.

 

Queue Rog....

[Rog]

It’s a very good move by the Pope and will be well received by all Jewish people.

 

It seems somewhat ironical to me that Jewish people of my age and especially younger totally accept that what took place in Germany under the Nazis was something that was awful, that was literally a holocaust, but also was something that was done a very long time ago. Far more so than so many English people who suffered far less.

 

As for meeting with the moslem people, let’s hope that he can get through to the people and establish relationships and understanding with the people as if he tries to reach a compromise with islam he is bound to fail.

 

The hope for the future lies with people learning to live with other people and not islam co-existing with any other religion. That is a lost cause.

 

I do hope that he doesn’t ignore Russia. We tend to forget that Russia lost in excess of 25,000,000 people to the Nazis, nor should he ignore China who suffered so much under the Japanese, another Axis power.

[simon]

I do hope that he doesn’t ignore Russia. We tend to forget that Russia lost in excess of 25,000,000 people to the Nazis, nor should he ignore China who suffered so much under the Japanese, another Axis power.

 

If he carries on in the tradition of JP2 - then he will only visit countries to which he is specifically invited and welcomed by both the host governments and the major national religious groups.

 

Hence, for example, JP2 never visited Russia even after the collapse of the Soviet system. Because of poor relations with the Russian Orthodox Church.

 

***AFAIK***

[ButterflyMaiden]

This does seem to be quite remarkable and a long time overdue.

The Catholic church has nothing to be proud of in respect of its conduct during WW2.

It is all the more remarkable given the current Pope's membership of the Hitler Youth organisation as a youngster.

This is a very good start to his Papacy and perhaps it signposts good things to come.