Pope Francis living with rabbi in Vatican, plan joint trip to Holy Land

Ecumenism is certainly a priority of Pope Francis.  His rabbi friend from Argentina has been staying with him for the past week in the Pope’s hotel-like domicile in the Vatican:

‘Never before in the history of Christian-Jewish relations have a Pope and a Rabbi celebrated their friendship by living in the Vatican together for several days, sharing all meals, including on two Jewish festivals and the Sabbath at which the Rabbi said prayers in Hebrew, and discussing what more they can do together to promote dialogue and peace in the world.

That is what actually happened over the past four days at the Vatican guesthouse (Santa Marta) where Pope Francis lives and where his friend from Buenos Aires, Rabbi Abraham Skorka, has been his guest from September 25 to this day.

“I eat with him at breakfast, lunch and dinner every day. He cares for me, and controls everything regarding my food to makes sure it is all kosher, and according to my religious tradition. These are festive days, and I have to say certain prayers at meals and, I expand the last prayer and translate it. He accompanies me together with the others at table -his secretaries and a bishop, and they all say ‘Amen’ at the end”, the Rabbi said.

By acting in this way, the Pope and Rabbi are sending an extraordinary message of friendship, dialogue and peace not only to their respective religious communities but also to the whole world. And they plan to do even more together, Rabbi Skorka revealed when we talked together at Santa Marta, on September 27.

He and the Pope are planning to travel together to the Holy Land next year. The Israeli and Palestinian authorities have invited Pope Francis, and the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew1, wants him to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the historic meeting of his predecessor, Athenagoras, with Paul VI in the Holy City.

“We are dreaming of traveling together to Israel soon, and the Pope is working on this subject”, the Rabbi said. “I dream of embracing him at the Kotel, or Wailing Wall, and I will accompany him to Bethlehem, in the Palestinian territories. His presence can help a lot at this moment when the peace talks are starting again”, he added.

Skorka sees a deep spiritual significance for both of them in being together at the sites that are sacred to their respective religions. “I do not cease to be a Jew for him, and he goes on keeping his own faith. But the two spiritualities have to have a point of encounter. We cannot live in a world where we reject each other, we must build bridges.”  [Hmmm…..an opinion asserted as a bald declaration of fact.]

“We come together without burying our identities. I spoke to him about evangelization, and he stated emphatically that the Catholic Church cannot engage in proselytism”, he said…’  [Then we may as well close up shop and shut down the Church. I pray this rabbi got the Pope’s meaning quite wrong.  Christ’s own Great Commission COMMANDS that we evangelize and even proselytize souls, proselytism just being a negative term for those who engage in eager evangelization, but that was exactly the kind of evangelization that converted many, many Jews to the Faith and eventually conquered much of the world.]

I will say this – there are many orthodox Jews who would condemn this rabbi’s conduct of his faith.  They would condemn his consorting with a gentile. The Church has constantly asserted – at least until the last 30-odd years, when ecumania really took hold – that Jews must convert for salvation, that their own “tradition” is a dead one, made obsolete by the New Covenant.  In fact, to posit that Jews have their own path to salvation, even with their rejection of the Incarnation of the Messiah, makes Christ into a liar and attacks the entire efficacy of the Gospels. It also makes into fools those many Jews (and others) who have converted to the One, True Faith.

But it seems at times that everything must be at the service of a worldly-oriented ecumenism, even the clearest of Dogmas.  The scandal this ecumenism so frequently causes the faithful is just brushed aside as a remnant of that poor, unfortunate “negative ecclesiology” some misguided souls adhere to, unable to accept the new order of things.

When will fools like me get with the program?