Pope is Not Welcome

Reflections of a Sad Reality: The Israeli Government during the Visit of Pope Benedict XVI

On behalf of the millions of our brothers and sisters who were slaughtered in the name of Christianity, we do not welcome Pope Benedict XVI to the Holy Land

Chaim Twerski 12/05/2009 15:19

No, he is not welcome here and we do not wish to receive him. The most powerful man in the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI is landing in Israel today and the insane disruptions in all systems that defy the good old ‘yiddishe kopf’ have reached their climax. Did we say insane? No, that is inadequate. It does not begin to describe the total lack of Jewish pride and self respect which the authorities are demonstrating in their massive preparations for the Pope’s visit to the Holy Land.

It seems like everyone is fighting for the honor of accommodating the Pope in our country and making his stay as pleasant as possible; President Peres suggests offering the Pope full authority over several Christian sites in Israel including a room in the Tomb of David as a gesture of goodwill; the police has set up a special, state-of-the-art situation room to supervise over the events the Pope will participate in; the residents of the Jewish Quarter are prevented from stepping out of their own houses for two days, as per the instructions of the government, and the media? The media has gone to great lengths to welcome the pope as respectably and properly as possible.

For 24 consecutive years before ascending to the Papacy, between the years 5741- 5765, he served as Prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and never once did he utter one word of condemnation or denounce the horrible acts the Church has been responsible for during hundreds of years. He did find it necessary, though, to express great concern regarding the situation of the poor Palestinians in the Holy Land.

Lifting the excommunication of Bishop Richard Williamson who has publicly denied the Holocaust and returning the Christian prayers for Jews to pursue Christianity, do not exactly add him any grace in our eyes. Supposedly intelligent people are not ashamed of openly discussing the prospect of the Pope officially forgiving the Jews for their ‘sin’. Do we need his forgiveness? The blood of millions of Jews who were burned alive, slaughtered and brutally tortured in the name of Christianity prevents us from forgiving the Church. What do wee need the forgiveness of the church for?

Hundreds of blood libels, fabricated stories about Jews stealing their ‘holy bread’, the burning of Holy Scriptures and the systematical embezzlement of Jewish concepts during hundreds of years are what Pope Benedict XVI represents. If he wishes to create a good atmosphere during his visit to the Holy Land, he should be so kind as to unlock the basement of the Vatican in Rome and return all the stolen possessions that have been lying there for so many years to its rightful owners – the Jewish People. These possessions have been taken from the hands of the Jews who were burned alive, hanged and slaughtered and who have suffered unbearable torture by the Church and its leaders.

The miserable justification of the Pope’s visit promoting tourism to Israel and boosting the economy, which might by the way have some amount of truth to it, totally loses its significance in light of the tens of millions of shekels that have been invested in the preparations for the Pope’s visit so far. So much money has been invested in infrastructure prior to the Papal visit; valleys have been straightened out and forests have been planted in order to create comfortable praying quarters for the Pope and his followers, at a time when no funds have been found to invest in the events of Lag Ba’omer and the Yahrtzeit of Rabi Shimon Bar Yochai which attract over half a million tourists from all over the world throughout the year.

Narrow and inaccessible roads greet the worshippers who come to pray in Meron. No funds could be found to improve those conditions. This Yahrtzeit is not worthy enough to receive equal attention from the short-minded leaders in Israel as the one-time visit of a man whose hands are covered in Jewish blood.