18 Friday, December 18, 1981 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS Peter Nichols' Book 'Roman Catholic Church Today' Lauds Israel's Treatment of the Various Religious Sects Peter Nichols, for many years a London Times cor- respondent, in a study of the Vatican's role today and the new approaches under cur- rent leadership, The Pope's Divisions? The Roman Catholic Church Today" (Holt, Rinehart and Winston), speaks approv- ingly of Israel's treatment of the many religious denomi- nations in the Jewish state. 'Outlining the discord among Christian groups, he makes the following in- teresting and revealing comments: The Israelis deserve a great deal more sympathy than they are usually ac- corded for having to deal with a problem which, be- fore they came to rule Jerusalem, caused trouble to the Turks and to the British: the state of chronic disagreement among the various Christian com- munities and particularly those with rights within the Christian holy places. "In the whole of Pales- tine there are about 35 different Christian churches and com- munities. Of these, six dif- ferent Christian churches claim rights and privileges within the church of the Holy Sepulchre — Christiani- ty's most sacred place of all. The claimants, apart from the Catholics, are the Greek Orthodox, the Arme- nians, the Copts, the Sy- rians and the Ethiopians. Because of the constant quarreling of the represen- r To: The Jewish News 17515 W. 9 Mile Rd. Suite 865 Southfield, Mich. 48075 WE Vf JUST 119Y From Paste in old label To NAME Effective Date eral countries, France and Russia in particular, showed a propensity for exploiting a favorable shift in the balance of power to further the interests of the churches they favored in the Holy Sepulchre. It is more than a scandal now, because an ecumenical movement is officially func- tioning and it is incapable of inspiring less Levantine conduct on the part of Jerusalem's official Christ- ians." The scandals listed here have been well known and they have been an inheri- tance of the Israeli adminis- trative forces since - the reunification of Jerusalem. While Nichols does not go into detail regarding Israel's treatment of the various sects, it has been established that the fracas has been success- 'fully averted. In his revealing and de- finitive book, Nichols refers to the credibility that had been. accorded to Ar- chbisfiop Hilarion Capucci, who was convicted in Israel for transporting weapons into the country for use by terrorists. Nichols states: "He was freed on the re- quest of Paul VI who under- took to send the bishop, who was an active organizer for Arafat's Palestinian Liber- ation Organization, to work in Latin America. He stayed there for a time, setting up a PLO headquarters, and was next heard of in Damascus and then practically super- seded the apostolic nuncio in Teheran in a new role as intermediary betweeen the Pope and Khomeini. I "He kept his official place in the PLO, despite the fact that at much the same time the Pope insisted that Father Robert Drinan, the highly respected Jesuit member of the U.S. Con- gress, should give up his seat as priests should not be directly involved in the political process." In reference to ex- Congressman Father Robert Drinan and the ruling by the present Pope which barred him from seeking re-election, Nichols makes this addi- tional comment: "The Vatican sought to explain that no criticism was intended of Father Dri- nan but that the move had been taken in application of a traditional Church policy, given renewed emphasis by John Paul II, that ordained priests ordinarily should not run for elective office or be otherwise engaged in partisan politics. (Although no longer a member of the House of Representatives, Father Drinan is still politically ac- , tive, according to the New York Times. In September, Father Drinan became the president of Americans for Democratic Action. He has crisscrossed the nation sev- eral times giving speeches deploring the arms race, pleading for an effective tatives of these historic Christian churches, the keys of the church of the Holy Sepulchre have been in the hands of a Muslim family for the last seven centuries. "The agreement which the Israelis inherited on how to deal with the Chris- tian churches represented in the sacred city is called the status quo and lays down in detail the situation as it exactly existed in the year 1757 and was sanctioned by the Ottoman government of the time. This situation was con- firmed by the 62nd article of the Treaty of Berlin in 1878. "The document on which the Israelis work isa defini- tion of rights and privileges drawn up by a British offi- cial in 1929 which sets out to describe precisely what the status quo is .. . "A footnote gives an eloquent idea, however couched in official lan- guage, of the type of dis- pute which constantly arose (and still does) — in this case a quarrel for possession of the Chapel of St. Nicodemus bet- ween the Armenians and the Syrian Jacobites: " As an instance, a fracas occurred between these communities at the conclu- sion of the Holy Fire Cere- mony, in 1927, when the Syrian-Jacobite Patriarch placed his chair in such a way as to prevent the exit of the Armenian procession.' "This constant scandal has had its diplomatic re- percussions, because sev- . human rights policy, oppos- ing the sale of AWACS planes to Saudi Arabia and publicizing the plight of the poor.) was affront "The nevertheless felt, and the question immediately raised of how this policy would be implemented in other parts of the world where priests hold ministe- rial posts: in Nicaragua, for instance, the government which overthrew the Somoza dictatorship had a priest as foreign minister and another as minister for culture, the formidable poet Father Cardenal." Nichols, in his treatment of the Capucci and Drinan incidents, conceded there is a pro-Palestinian attitude inthe official church circles. In the matter of Jerusalem he states: "It is no bad thing to remember that, if Israel's conduct in Jerusalem is criticized, and rightly, the Christian presence is nothing to boast about, in the past and now. It is at this point that he indi- cated the fracas fre- quently evidenced among the Christian sects in Jerusalem. Nichols also takes into account the ecumenical ex- periences and the role in it of Cardinal Bea. Here is an account which adds signifi- cance to the Nichols analyses: "For instance, the Jewish view of Jesus is a salutary one because it is profes- sional and at the same time unhampered by the need for awe, and thus human qual- ities emerge more clearly. "Dr. Nicholas de Lange, lecturer in rabbinics at Cambridge, gave an excel- lent summary of how Jews see Jesus in a lecture named in memory of Cardinal Bea, first head of the Vatican's Secretariat for Christian Unity and architect of the Vatican Council's exonera- tion of the Jews for the death of Jesus: " The Jewish followers of . Jesus during his lifetime were involved in a real, fleshly encounter, and they responded to the undoubted power of his personality and his message. But they were surely mistaken if they be- lieved he was the Messiah who would rescue Israel and inaugurate a new and hap- pier age. The condition of the Jews actually deterior- ated after his death. " The early Church made brave efforts to explain the apparent fai- lure of his mission and to convert it into a triumph, but these efforts, how- ever successful they were among gentiles, never succeeded in convincing the vast mass of Jews.' "There is a refreshing candor untouched by cant in these reflections and an at- titude which the most cer- tain Christian could do well to consider for a moment, if only to show strength enough to reject such ideas rationally: " 'In the sense in which I understand these terms as a Jew, I cannot see Jesus as the Messiah, the son of David, or as the inau- gurator of a Messianic age. I do not count him among the prophets, as our Muslim brothers do. I cannot think of him as Lord, or as the son of God, and I certainly do not believe that a man can be God. " 'It is not the way of Judaism to engage in a 'cult of personality,' to elevz any one human being abov., all the others. Abraham, Moses, Isaiah were great men, with a great and en- during message for man- kind., but they were merely men and shared our human weaknesses. I cannot think that Jesus was greater than these. Nor can I accept that Jesus's purpose was to do away with Judaism as he found it. " He had his criticisms, to be sure, but he wanted to perfect the law of Moses, not to annul it. The Christian hostility to this law strikes me as a betrayal of Jesus' teach- ing as well as a serious barrier to the recognition of the Christians as truly part of the people of Israel ...' " Nichols' study of the Vat- ican in its current status is a remarkable book. It serves a great need for understand- ing and it renders fairness and justice to the Jewish re- latiohships with the Catholic Church. It is a highly commendable book. Black Jewish Freshman Sparks Basketball Revival at Yeshiva. U. NEW YORK — The dif- ference between the athletic program at Yeshiva Uni- versity and the programs at the NCAA's sports-minded major schools is, both in substance and philosophy, a vast one. But this year's basketball team at the small (NCAA Division III), religiously oriented school, has a com- modity which basketball powerhouses such as In- diana and Notre Dame often dream about. A talented, dynamic freshman guard, capable of turning the team into a winner and generat- ing a dramatic increase in attendance. Joey Eaves, a fourth- generation black Jew who averaged 29 points and 12 assists as a senior in high school, has been instrumen- tal in Yeshiva's 2-0 start this season, the New York Times reported. (Last year's team finished with a 4-17 record.) Eaves, whose father is a rabbi, is the youngest of 11 children. His great- grandfather converted to Judaism while living in the West Indies. The fam- ily moved to Jackson- ville, Fla., Boston, and eventually Hartford, Conn., where Rabbi Jehu Eaves' synagogue is cated. Eaves rises at 8 every morning to daven before breakfast. From 9 to 12:30 he is immersed in Hebrew studies and attends classes until basketball practice, late in the afternoon. Eaves plans to attend graduate school, probably for a degree in business, although he is sure that his father would love to see him become a rabbi. Among his brothers and sisters there is a doctor and a lawyer. The Yeshiva freshman says he took a lot of kidding about his religion while growing-up in the predomi- nantly black Roxbury sec- tion of Boston. The courts at the neighborhood boys' cen- ter provided him with his basketball education. "My cousin, who's also Jewish, and I were known as the Jewish Connection," said Eaves. "All my five brothers played basketball. "One had a scholarship to the University of Washing- ton." The 5'9", 131-pound guard has averaged 19 points and 10.5 assists in Yeshiva's two victories, an 88-40 blowout against Bard and a 63-53 win against New York Maritime. The game with Bard, played on Yeshiva's home court, drew 150 fans; not a bad gate for a team that has played some recent home games in front of crowds of 10 people. Arab Classroom Shortage Is Cut NAZARETH (JNI) — While announcing a 40 per- cent reduction of the Arab classroom shortage, the Is- rael Education Ministry has also inaugurated joint Jewish - Arab classes. Two volunteers will instruct 100 high school students for the Nazareth area in math and computers. In addition to increased building, the shortage of Arab 'classrooms is slowly being eliminated by a fal- ling birthrate among Arab and Druze According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, while non-Jews comprise 16.2 percent of Israel's popula- tion, their birthrate has de- clined by a third in the past 15 years. But the Arab birthrate of 32.2 per 1,000 is still very high compared with the Jewish rate of 14.8 per 1,000. Never replicate a success- ful experiment.