A rchive Date
[ 30-05-2000 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Religion ]
|
[Romans passed death sentence
It's time to quit blaming Jews for killing Jesus Christ
By LICIA CORBELLA
Calgary Sun
April 2, 2000
Apparently, this is going to come as an enormous shock to some people, including those who have risen to the lofty height of Roman Catholic Cardinal: Jesus Christ was a Jew. So, too, was the Virgin Mary, Joseph, Moses, Abraham, King David, Solomon and the Christian church's greatest evangelists ever - Peter, Paul, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
This came to mind recently in the wake of Pope John Paul II apologizing to Israel and Jewish people for atrocities committed against them by the Catholic Church over the centuries.
It was the right and proper thing to do, because there have been many atrocities committed against Jews in the name of the Roman Catholic Church, and the church on the whole.
Just prior the Pope's great pilgrimage to the Holy land, which came to an end last Sunday, the CBC interviewed a Jesuit Cardinal, Peter Gumpel, who has been designated by the Vatican to oversee the canonization of Pope Pius XII - which is in itself an abomination of an idea.
Pius XII has been widely accused of indifference to Jewish suffering at the hands of the Nazis during the Second World War. He stayed silent even as reliable information was coming to him from Germany that Jews were being exterminated.
Had he spoken out, he may have been able to save millions of Jewish lives. By remaining silent, many Catholics in Germany turned their backs on their Jewish neighbours and did not help them escape the horrible fate Hitler had planned for them.
Yes, it's true, thousands of Catholics and other Christians did save many Jewish lives, but so many more could have been.
Gumpel told a CBC-TV reporter that it is "an undeniable historical fact" that Jews killed Christ. That statement is undeniably deniable.
Even the Bible itself says that Christ was sentenced to death by the Roman procurator of Judea at the time - Pontius Pilate.
He was a Gentile, not a Jew. That some Jewish leaders at the time charged Christ with blasphemy for saying he was God is true, but it was Pilate who passed the death sentence upon Christ and Roman guards who whipped him and nailed him to a cross.
Gumpel then went on to say that the Jews have never expressed any regret that Christ was killed. What a ridiculous statement.
One has to seriously wonder where the Catholic Church finds these people.
The whole reason why Christ came to earth was to die in our place for our sins.
His death was prophesied in great detail thousands of years prior to being nailed to the cross. In fact, after Christ explained to his disciples that the time of His death was near and that He would be tortured, killed and then rise from the dead three days later, Peter, the disciple whom Jesus loved very dearly, started to argue with Christ.
At that, Christ rebuked Peter, saying: "Get behind me, Satan! You do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men."
If Christ could talk to Cardinal Gumpel, he would probably say the same thing.
If Gumpel doesn't understand this basic aspect of Christianity, one really has to wonder how he got into his position of Cardinal receiving commissions from the Vatican.
Ultimately, people have been committing atrocities in Christ's name right from the get go.
In fact, Christ warned people about that. He said many will come in my name but do not be deceived.
Christ said you will be able to determine one of His disciples by their fruit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and healing.
Christ did not say, whoever lops off the most heads in my name wins. In fact, in the greatest speech ever uttered - the sermon on the Mount - Christ put forward ideas that were utterly revolutionary at the time and in some parts of the world still are. All of Christ's teachings are wrapped up in love.
Ideas like, love your enemy, love your neighbour as yourself, turn the other cheek.
Those ideas turned the world on its ear and have bettered the lot of billions. Jesus' teachings are the groundrock of our entire western civilization. The foundation of the laws and constitutions in the U.S. and Britain, and therefore Canada, were originally based on the teachings of Jesus.
Essentially, what all this means is that those who committed atrocities against Jews and others were very likely no more Christian than the swords, guns or gas chambers they have used throughout history to exterminate their enemies or neighbours.
They can call themselves whatever they want - a turnip, a lamppost or a Christian, but that doesn't mean that they were or are.
Cardinal Gumpel can try to sugar-coat his comments all he wants. He says he was quoted out of context. Nonsense. His comments were not just historically incorrect, they were anti-Semitic. Has he ever wondered aloud why the Roman people have not apologized for killing Christ? Of course not.
Yet it would be less ridiculous than wondering why the Jews have not.
Over the centuries, Jews have been persecuted and murdered by those acting on the myth that it was Jews who killed the world's most influential Jew ever - Jesus Christ. That myth has to stop.
Licia Corbella, editor of the Calgary Sun, can be reached at 403-250-4129 or by e-mail at lcorbell@sunpub.com]
|