Re: Pope's apology

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In reading about the upcoming apology for wrongs done by Catholics, I got to thinking about something I read. It was about wrongs and prejudices from the past to the present. Why would Catholics not like Jews if Jesus was a Jew? And why are we taught that this (Catholic) is the church He founded if He was a Jew? Shouldn't we be Jewish then? Thanks!

-- jackiea (jackiea@hotmail.com), March 11, 2000

Answers

Response to Re: pope's apology

Jackiea: We have to make a distinction between Jew by race, Jew by religion and "spiritual Jew".

a-- Jew by race is a person born to Jewish parents. In that sense we are not Jews.

b-- Jew by religion, namely that a persons practices the Jewish religion even though not necessarily born from Jewish parents (a convert for example).

c-- "Spiritual Jews" I consider all Christians spritual Jews, since we are spiritual descendants of Abraham "the fahter of all the faithful".

d-- Jesus was a Jew, certainly, but He himself, gave us a New Covenant, thus making the Old obsolete. He taught us to keep whatever was of perennial value from the Old Testament but He established a New Law, a new Priesthood, a new Sacrifice, a new relation with the Fahter, since we are His brothers and sisters. Etc. ETC.

e-- The dislike many Christians had and still have for Jews is due to a wrong understanding of the words of the Jewish Priests before Pilate: Let his blood fall upon our heads... Jesus died not only by the hate and envy of the Jewish Priests, but also by the sins of all mankind...so we are as guilty as they were.

f-- God himself sent Paul to the gentiles, that is the non-Jews, to bring them the Gospel and salvation. The promises of the Old Testament were to be fulfilled from that time on "in the new People of God".

h-- There is no reason for Christians to despise or hate Jews, since, according to Paul Israel shall one day convert to Christ...

Enrique

-- Enrique Ortiz (eaortiz@yahoo.com), March 11, 2000.


Response to Re: pope's apology

I just seem to be thanking you all over the place today! :) Thank you for such a very thorough answer. It helps me understand better now.

-- jackiea (jackiea@hotmail.com), March 11, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

After reading about it today, I have a question. Who exactly are the "people of the Covenant"? Thanks!

-- jackiea (jackiea@hotmail.com), March 13, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

I think that the Pope is extremely HOMOSEXUAL! he deserves to get ass-raped! muhhwwwaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!

-- Fat Man (Gobbink@aol.com), March 13, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

young man, this is not a message board for you to be making fun of, we are talking about real issues here, and I'd thank you to take them seriously or leave.

-- Art (arthur_m@hotmail.com), March 13, 2000.


Response to Re: pope's apology

jackiea asks, "Who exactly are the 'people of the Covenant?'"

Hi, jackiea.
I have found that this is a very popular term for religious people to adopt. God made several covenants with His "chosen" people -- with Noah, with Abraham, with Moses and the Israelites, etc.. Thus one may speak of the Jews as "people of the Covenant."
Jesus shed the "Blood of the New Covenant." Thus one may speak of Christians as "people of the Covenant."

Now, I have seen that some non-Christians, such as the Bahai and Mormons, are speaking of themselves as "People of the Covenant" -- though I don't know why they are doing this. Perhaps they have a covenant among themselves, since God has not revealed Himself directly to them (as He has to Jews and Christians) and they have no covenant with Him.

God bless you. JFG

-- J. F. Gecik (jgecik@desc.dla.mil), March 13, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

Fat Man: are you talking about your personal experiences? We have no interest in your sexual deviations. Please leave. Adolfo.

-- Adolfo Rico (egutz@hotmail.com), March 14, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

--This is interesting. The Jews are the chosen people of God. Nothing in the holy gospels has ever disputed it. Our Lord is a Jew; His holy mother and all his forebears in the natural order were Jews, and still are-- Herod was not a Jew; Pilate wasn't and I am not. But I would never dream of aligning with Herod, Pilate or those Jews who undisputably paid blood money (30 pieces of silver) for Jesus' deliverance into their hands. As for the guilt some have assigned to Jews, for the death of Our Lord: He clearly said ''I lay down my life; and I can take it up again. No one can take it from me.'' As well as: ''Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.'' As both these stress: Don't blame them.

-- Eugene Chavez (rechavez@popmail.ucsd.edu), April 02, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

[Posted by J. F. Gecik, April 3, 2000]

The media, as well as many Christians and Jews, seem surprised at the recent events involving Pope John Paul II and Judaism. It seems as though almost everyone has forgotten that the real breakthrough occurred 35 years ago at the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council. One of the sixteen documents prepared by the "Fathers" (2500 bishops) of the Council was:
NOSTRA AETATE ("In our time") -- The Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions Second Vatican Council (October, 1965)

[Here is a pertinent section of the text]:
... 4. As the sacred synod searches into the mystery of the Church, it remembers the bond that spiritually ties the people of the New Covenant to Abraham's stock. Thus the Church of Christ acknowledges that, according to God's saving design, the beginnings of her faith and her election are found already among the Patriarchs, Moses, and the prophets. She professes that all who believe in Christ --Abraham's sons according to faith -- are included in the same Patriarch's call, and likewise that the salvation of the Church is mysteriously foreshadowed by the chosen people's exodus from the land of bondage. The Church, therefore, cannot forget that she received the revelation of the Old Testament through the people with whom God in His inexpressible mercy concluded the Ancient Covenant. Nor can she forget that she draws sustenance from the root of that well-cultivated olive tree onto which have been grafted the wild shoots, the Gentiles. Indeed, the Church believes that by His cross Christ, Our Peace, reconciled Jews and Gentiles. making both one in Himself.

The Church keeps ever in mind the words of the Apostle about his kinsmen: "theirs is the sonship and the glory and the covenants and the law and the worship and the promises; theirs are the fathers and from them is the Christ according to the flesh" (Rom. 9:4-5), the Son of the Virgin Mary. She also recalls that the Apostles, the Church's main-stay and pillars, as well as most of the early disciples who proclaimed Christ's Gospel to the world, sprang from the Jewish people.

As Holy Scripture testifies, Jerusalem did not recognize the time of her visitation, nor did the Jews in large number, accept the Gospel; indeed not a few opposed its spreading. Nevertheless, God holds the Jews most dear for the sake of their Fathers; He does not repent of the gifts He makes or of the calls He issues -- such is the witness of the Apostle. In company with the Prophets and the same Apostle, the Church awaits that day, known to God alone, on which all peoples will address the Lord in a single voice and "serve him shoulder to shoulder."

Since the spiritual patrimony common to Christians and Jews is thus so great, this sacred synod wants to foster and recommend that mutual understanding and respect which is the fruit, above all, of biblical and theological studies as well as of fraternal dialogues. True, the Jewish authorities and those who followed their lead pressed for the death of Christ; still, what happened in His passion cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today. Although the Church is the new people of God, the Jews should not be presented as rejected or accursed by God, as if this followed from the Holy Scriptures. All should see to it, then, that in catechetical work or in the preaching of the word of God they do not teach anything that does not conform to the truth of the Gospel and the spirit of Christ.

Furthermore, in her rejection of every persecution against any man, the Church, mindful of the patrimony she shares with the Jews and moved not by political reasons but by the Gospel's spiritual love, decries hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone. Besides, as the Church has always held and holds now, Christ underwent His passion and death freely, because of the sins of men and out of infinite love, in order that all may reach salvation. It is, therefore, the burden of the Church's preaching to proclaim the cross of Christ as the sign of God's all-embracing love and as the fountain from which every grace flows.

5. We cannot truly call on God, the Father of all, if we refuse to treat in a brotherly way any man, created as he is in the image of God. Man's relation to God the Father and his relation to men his brothers are so linked together that Scripture says: "He who does not love does not know God" (1 John 4:8). No foundation therefore remains for any theory or practice that leads to discrimination between man and man or people and people, so far as their human dignity and the rights flowing from it are concerned. The Church reproves, as foreign to the mind of Christ, any discrimination against men or harassment of them because of their race, color, condition of life, or religion. On the contrary, following in the footsteps of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, this sacred synod ardently implores the Christian faithful to "maintain good fellowship among the nations" (1 Peter 2:12), and, if possible, to live for their part in peace with all men, so that they may truly be sons of the Father who is in heaven.

God bless you.
John

-- J. F. Gecik (jgecik@desc.dla.mil), April 03, 2000.

Response to Re: pope's apology

Dear friends,

I saw an application made of the passage from St Luke, where the aged Simeon, outside the Temple saw the Baby Jesus, and prophesying, saying, ''Now Thou dost dismiss thy servant, Lord . . '' and that this Child was to be the fall and the rise of many in Israel, and, speaking to Mary, ''Thine own heart a sword shall pierce.''

The application of these words were approximate to this: SWORD, in the biblical sense is the symbol of DIVISION. Mary, Mother of The Holy One of Israel, was at the point of estrangement from her own people. They would, by the Will of God, become separate-- from the New Israel, Christianity. She was the holiest maiden out of all the children of the Promise; but her heart was riven in two, between her race, and the new Church. A very touching and beautiful analogy, I thought.

-- Eugene Chavez (rechavez@popmail.ucsd.edu), April 04, 2000.



Response to Re: pope's apology

I SEE NOW THAT THE MORE I READ AND LISTEN TO OTHERS CONCERNING GOD, THE MORE I SEE THEY DONT AGREE ON CRAP. AND FOR THE MOST PART I DONT THINK NONE OFYOU KNOW WHAT THE HELL YOUR TALKING ABOUT. SO LET ME SUM IT ALL UP FOR YOU..OK

AGREE ON THIS GOD IS REAL, GOD IS LOVE , IF YOU CANT PASS 1ST DONT ATTEMPT TO GO TO 3RD..OK AGAIN.. BACK TO BASICS

-- robert escavia (known@hotmail.com), May 01, 2003.


Members of the Church of JESUS CHRIST of latter day saints are NOT Christians?.. that is ridiculous... IF it were the case.. the name of the church would be 'The church of MORMON' .. which it is NOT. He is barely mentioned by Latter Day Saints.. but "the Saviour Jesus Christ" is brainwashed into your head more-so than G-D himself. In fact G-D is downplayed in favour Of the importance of JESUS. Over 20 yrs of Mormonism taught me that much. Im not one today but not because they are not "Christians".. thats just an uneducated, ludicrous statement!

-- rachael goldstein (rsg@hotmail.com), December 01, 2003.

In fact the church was originally called "The Church of Latter Day Saints". They inserted the name of Jesus into their title later, in an effort to sound more acceptable to Christians, from who they were taking most of their converts. It doesn't matter how often they mention the name of Jesus. What they teach about Jesus is totally incompatible with Christian theology. Therefore they are not Christian.

-- Paul M. (PaulCyp@cox.net), December 01, 2003.

am i or am i not correct when i state that mormon theology teaches that Jesus was not divine but merely a prophet?

a christian being defined as one who recognizes the divinity of Christ, means that by the very definition of the word mormons cannot be Christians... then again, nor can JW's for that matter.

-- paul h (dontSendMeMail@notAnAddress.com), December 01, 2003.


The Pope was apologizing for the sins of individual Catholics - including priests and some bishops who taught things and did things which were at odds with actual and authentic Catholic teaching.

The problem is two-fold: not everything a Catholic utters is "Catholic teaching" yet everything a Catholic does somehow implicates the whole Church.

Take for example abortion or gay marriage [sic]. You will find Catholic lay men and women, nuns, priests, and bishops in favor not only of abortion (at least in some instances) but also on virtually anything the LGBT crowd want to do...simply because they want to do it. But while they are "Catholics", they don't speak for the Catholic Church!

Begining with St Peter, the Popes have sought to convert Jews - and the fact that there has been a synagogue in Rome for centuries proves that the Papacy has not been implicated in anti-semitism. But many other Catholic countries and particular bishops did fall into anti- semitism and other sins and crimes too.

For their moral failure and sins, we are sorry. They are our fellow brothers in Christ who have sinned and led others into sin. We are embarrassed for them and apologize for them. But the Pope did NOT apologize for being Catholic or for the Catholic faith.

-- Joe (joestong@yahoo.com), December 01, 2003.



Hi, Paul H.
You asked about the Mormon view of Jesus.
If you go to the "Catholic Answers" site and read about this and related topics, it will take your breath away. Go down to to about the mid-point of the page I am going to link for you now. (But maybe you should start reading earlier so that you can find out about God the Father.)
JFG

-- J. F. Gecik (jfgecik@hotmail.com), December 01, 2003.

First of all, the Pope did not "apologize" for anything. That inaccurate term was introduced by the secular media. A person cannot "apologize" for something he played no part in, and had no personal responsibility for. What the Holy Father did was officially express regret over the sinful actions of other men in other times, who happened to be members of the one true Church. In so doing, He showed himself to be a man of profound holiness, compassion, honesty, and humility. All that members of other churches can do in the face of such godly virtue is gawk and point out additional things he might have "apologized" for. Perhaps instead they should write to their own leaders, pointing out the godly example of this living Catholic saint, and asking them why they have not likewise come forward to express regrets for the crimes of their former and present members. For example, why has no Protestant leader publicly expressed regrets for the hundreds of innocent women burned and hung as witches by superstitious Protestants? Members of the Protestant tradition have not had nearly as long to commit atrocities against their fellow man as members of the true Church; but they have managed to do at least their fair share during their relatively brief existence. Their feeble criticisms of the Vicar of Jesus Christ only serve to highlight the shallowness of their own doctrinal beliefs, and the worldliness of their elected or hired leaders.

-- Paul M. (PaulCyp@cox.net), December 01, 2003.

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