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OP-ED

Vatican Sending Wrong Signals

GEORGE C. HIGGINS

I

n a recent editorial the Israeli news-
paper Davar said, "it is easy to under-
stand the disappointment" of the U.S.
Jewish community, which has been work-
ing for so long to improve Jewish-Catholic
relations," in the way New York Cardinal
John O'Connor's trip to Israel turned out.
It is less easy, I suspect, for U.S.
Catholics to understand the ongoing dis-
tress of American Jews over Vatican pol-
icy toward Israel and the often ambiguous,
fine lines of prOtocol (the cardinal could
meet with Israel's president in his study
but not his office, etc.) that the policy
seemingly entails.
A strong case can be made for the
•
broad outlines of Vatican policy as illus-
trated in the constraints put on the cardi-
nal's itinerary. Vatican policy is not, after
all ; very different from official U.S. policy.
The Vatican regognizes the state of Is-
rael's existence and supports its right to
"the desired security and the due tranquil-
ity that is the prerogative of every nation"
(Pope John Paul II,--"Redemptionis Anno,"
April 1984).
It rejects, as does the U.S. govern-
ment, Israel's "unilateral" action in dec-
laring Jerusalem its capital without the
agreement of the Arab population of the
disputed territories.
Unlike the United States, however,
the Vatican has refused to exchange am-
bassadors with Israel until an overall set-
tlement is reached.
• Exchanging ambassadors is a sym-
bolic gesture as well as a pragmatic dip-
lomatic decision. It is a means of com-
municating essential statements of trust,
in this instance not just between two states
but between two peoples, the church and
the Jewish people.
This, at least, is how Jews universally
understand the situation, though I believe
the framers of policy in the holy see under-
stand it more narrowly — solely as a dip-
lomatic issue. -

There is, then, •a wide gap in percep-
tion between what the church intends to
say by withholding official relations (that
is, we have some serious problems with
Israeli policy that need adjudicating under
the procedures of international law") and
what it in fact is communicating to Jews
(that is, the church rejects the Jewish
people's right to organize as a nation
among the world's nations").
This gap is why an otherwise minor
matter of diplomacy between two small
Mediterranean states can intrude so de-

Msgr. Higgins is the former head of the Social
Action Department of the National Conference
of Catholic Bishops. This article appeared in
the Jan. 30 issue of the Michigan Catholic.

Judy dusidncler, 1.a.s.

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Cardinal O'Connor:
Disappointing signals.

eply into the dialogue between American
Catholics and Jews.
This is also why so many Jewish
commentaries raise the possibility that
questionable "theological reasons" lie be-
hind the Vatican policy. I do not believe
that Jewish fears of a regression by the
church of the "bad old days" of medieval -
disputations are justified. One can explain
Vatican actions quite adequately as
"real-politik" without recourse to the
teaching of contempt. ,
But I can understand why Jews would
not be as sanguine about the purity of Vat-
ican intentions as are Catholics. Jews
have read their history and ours.
Pope John Paul II's visit to the Rome
synagogue last year was a significant
symbolic gesture precisely because of that
history. But its meaning for Jews is at best
obscured by the church's ongoing gesture
of withholding relations with Israel.
As Rabbi Harlan J. Wechsler recently
noted in a op-ed piece in the New York
Times, the real embarrassment pointed
out by the controversy surrounding the
cardinal's trip is that it seems to illustrate
that the church does not want to acknowl-
edge the "vast transformation of Jewish
life in our day . . . Israel, the ancient _
Jewish homeland, has been reborn."
Is this what the Vatican intends to say,
to Jews? I think not. But until it changes
its policy toward Israel that will be how its
gestures are understood by them. The
dialogue between Catholics and Jews will
continue to suffer for it.

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