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April 15, 2005/Nisan 6 5765, Volume 57, No. 33
Jews await selection of the new pope
RUTH ELLEN GRUBER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
NEW YORK - The death of Pope John Paul II triggered an unprecedented outpouring of tribute from Jews around the world.
Israel's president and a half-dozen Jewish officials from Europe, the United States and Latin America joined the millions of pilgrims who converged on Rome for his funeral. Synagogues offered special prayers in his honor, and leaders of Jewish organizations and some rabbis hailed him as a champion of Jewish-Catholic relations.
Some commentators went so far as to call him "the Jews' pope."
As the College of Cardinals prepared to begin secret deliberations next week to choose a successor, the question remained to what extent John Paul's exceptionally proactive policy regarding Jews would endure.
"It seems unlikely that the next pope will have the same interest in the church's relations with the Jews, and the same sense of responsibility in combating Christian anti-Semitism," professor David Kertzer of Brown University, an expert on papal relations with the Jews, told JTA from Rome.
John Paul made bettering Jewish-Catholic relations a cornerstone of his papacy. He repeatedly condemned anti-Semitism, commemorated the Holocaust and met with Jewish leaders and laymen. He also oversaw the establishment of diplomatic relations with the State of Israel.
Even before John Paul died there were indications his policies had not been accepted unanimously among world church leaders - or trickled down to the world's 1.1 billion Catholics.
Kertzer said he had noted "backsliding in the last few years when the pope had become infirm and no longer really in control."
JTA Staff Writer Rachel Pomerance in New York contributed to this story.
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