Catholics and Jews - sparring continues.

Los Angeles--The Jewish group conducting formal dialogue with the Vatican has prepared a reply to the Catholic document released in March (for full text of March document, see Catholic Insight, "Catholics and Jews," July/August 1998, pp. 30-34).

Reuters news agency said it had obtained a draft copy of the response from the International Jewish Committee on Inter-religious Consultations, which apparently disputes the Vatican's defence of Pope Pius XII as someone who saved hundreds of thousands of Jewish lives during World War Two. The document also reportedly says the Catholic Church herself must bear some responsibility for Hitler's genocidal attack on Jews.

The report refers to the defence of Pope Pius, saying the Vatican cannot defend a pontiff who "never once explicitly mentioned the Jews in his public pronouncements during World War Two." Some prominent Jewish leaders have praised the Vatican document We Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah, as well as Pope Pius, while others have denounced both.

The Jewish committee report also accuses the Church of complicity in the Holocaust because "Hitler, Himmler, and other Nazi leaders were all baptized Christians who were never excommunicated."

The committee includes representatives of the Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox branches of Judaism as well as the World Jewish Congress, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-Defamation League, B'nai B'rith, and the Israel Interfaith Committee (CWN, Aug. 28, 1998).