AJ R Information Volume XLIX No. 3 March 1994 £3 (to non-members) Don't miss . Good news that should have come sooner George Eliot and Edith Wharton p7 The Cross and the Star Lebens- bestatigung p9 he Vatican's recognition of Israel is a milestone, Catholic countries any more. Poland today has a Prurient for all that it comes 45 years after the birth of smaller Jewish population than any North London the Jewish State. It is a further step on the road borough. This is, of course, essentially the result of Purlmspiel pi6 T towards acceptance of Israel as a 'normal' country by Nazi rule, but it should not be forgotten that in the the comity of nations. Rome's previous shameful 1930's Cardinal Hlond, the head of the Polish prevarication on this issue - it dubbed the Israeli Church, preached a boycott that pauperised tens of Shoring up Philharmonic (who played before Pius XII) 'a group thousands of Jewish petty traders; in 1946 the Bishop truth of refugee musicians'; on his 1964 Israel visit Paul VI of Kielce even condoned an anti-Jewish massacre. refused to pronounce the country's name — is now I The trigger of the Kielce pogrom — the disappear­ thankfully, a closed chapter. t is not often ance of a Christian boy - belonged to an 800-year old that a While Roman Catholics are hardly numerous in the tradition dating back to the story of John of Norwich, Hollywood Middle East, other, larger. Christian minorities in the related in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The 'blood moviI e forms the area will, no doubt, be positively influenced by the libel' that Jews slaughtered Christian children at subject matter of Vatican's move. Worldwide, Rome has nearly a Easter-time was only one of several forms of demoni­ The Times first billion adherents, at least nominally, and the change sation, alongside the charge of poisoning wells during leader, but this is in Papal attitudes must benefit Jews within their the Black Death and of desecrating the Host (i.e. the precisely what has ambit. Alas, there are not all that many Jews living in Eucharist wafer). Such demonisation had its origin a happened with thousand years earlier, when the Gospel writers Schindler's Ark. created the stereotype of the Jews as Christ killers, Spielberg's film, while the early Church Fathers dubbed the synagogue which looks set to 'the habitation of Satan'. become a worldwide box- Nonetheless, Jews and Christians had coexisted office draw, is to fairly amicably until the Crusades. Then the horizon be welcomed on a darkened. The large-scale Rhineland pogroms were number of counts. compounded by the Lateran decrees that Jews had to Above all, it will wear distinctive clothing and confine themselves to shore up the truth the profession of money-lending. West European about the kings ordered country-wide expulsions. Holocaust against its erosion by neo- Yet amid all this gloom there were fleeting gleams Nazis and bogus of light. Bernard of Clairvaux tried to mitigate the historians. Rhineland massacres, Thomas Aquinas counselled Secondly, it should moderating the harshest anti-Jewish measures, and counteract present- several Renaissance Popes adopted a liberal stance. day indifference to Then came the backlash. The Counter-Reforma­ history (in late tion blighted the springtime promise of Renaissance twentieth century humanism. Paul IV ordered the corralling of Jews in jargon Ghettoes, an Italian practice that swept Europe; in the 'compassion ruins of the 30-Years War Abraham a Santa Clara fatigue'). Lastly, it preached incitement to pogroms. might also blunt the impact of Jew- At the end of the 18th century the tide again began baiters who to turn - but in Western society, not the Church as currently stir the such. Secularisation lifted disabilities based on re­ racial pot in ligion, making Jewish emancipation possible. The environments as Church, smarting under its loss of influence, hit back disparate as by attacking Democracy, Free Thought and the Jews. Rumania and The resultant rise, around 1880, of Roman Cathohc Harlem. D Ecclesia and Synagoga, symbolic reprcscnt.itioni of Christianity and Judaism at Strasbourg Cathedral (circa 1230). continued on page 2 mmM^>,^„^mmm,t^^«„i^>mmm/ - AJR INFORMATION MARCH 1994 continued from page 1 parties like the German Zentrum and the Profile Austrian Christlichsoziale, went hand in hand with the birth of 'modern' antisemi­ ing the lost lapidary skills for this country. tism. This antisemitism turned increasingly Recovering a lost sl<ill He drew on his own diamond-cutting racial, thus outstripping purely religious factory experience, immersed himself in categories. But racist antisemitism only reference books and purchased secondhand triumphed half a century later and when it equipment abroad. Eventually he mastered did so, in 1930s Germany, the Church also the lost craft and in turn trained others, the suffered. In the interim politicised Catholi­ first of whom became his workshop cism had culpably pandered to reaction in manager; the workshop, incidentally, now the France of the Dreyfus affair, the Austria exports a fifth of its output. of Lueger, and the Bavaria of the Oberam­ Eighteen months ago Robert Acker-Holt mergau Passion Play and the Mistelbacher was asked to restore plinths damaged in the Anzeiger (forerunner of Der Stiirmer]. Windsor Castle fire. Last December he During the Second World War the received the National Training Award pre­ universal Catholic Church refused to take sented by the Secretary of State for Employ­ sides. Weaned on an aversion to liberal ment. The press release spoke of Robert democracy, Vatican policy makers 'starting from scratch on the construction of appeared to be leaning towards the Axis. precision machinery where all was trial and Pius XII 'ignored' the Holocaust, which was error, nothing available off the peg'. actively abetted by Slovak and Croat clerics. The story of Robert's award was picked But it would be wrong to generalise. While Robert Acker-Holt. Photo: Neivman. up by The Independent which headed it Croat Franciscans staffed concentration 'Plaudits for a polished performer'. And so camps, Italian ones saved Jews; Jews were t is generally accepted that refugees made say all of us! r-i D /- likewise hidden in French, Belgian and a significant contribution to British life. l_l R.G. Hungarian religious houses. I However, thanks to the prominence I III I I III I J III! Ill I il I iriii III i» I IW I III \-iis iffl.mi" Alas, a new scandal erupted postwar enjoyed by 'our' scholars and scientists, when Bishop Hudal and members of the refugee industrialists have probably had less Pallotine Order operated the 'rat-line' that than their due. 40 Years Ago spirited Nazi monsters to South America. To make something of a contribution in this Month For nearly two decades after the war the the industrial sphere one doesn't necessarily Church seemed becalmed in face of its own have to march with the big battalions - as LETTER FROM JERUSALEM involvement in the Jewish catastrophe. Pope the story of Robert Ackerhalt demonstrates. During the past nine months Israel's John XXIII ushered in a new spirit — Vienna-born, he came from a family with economy has undergone such a fundamental highlighted by Vatican II expunging the links to England that made emigration after change, in fact, almost a complete reversal, that one is surprised how little appears to be known phrase 'perfidious Jews' from the liturgy — the Anschluss relatively easy. Over here his about it elsewhere. Indeed, the transformation but his pontificate was cut tragically short. ex-shopkeeper father obtained work at from a seller's to a buyer's market, from the There were impersonal positive forces at Bloomsbury House and he did odd jobs empty shops full of customers, has been accompanied by something of a conspiracy of work, however. Right across Catholic before attending Park Royal Training silence. Western Europe Church-supported parties Centre. With the knowhow thus acquired Israel has become a land of plenty - plenty of embraced liberal values. The more liberal he worked at designing the Horsa gliders food, plenty of luxuries, plenty of everything except money. The State has no funds to pay civil Catholics realised the evil consequences of which played a significant role in the servants' salaries on time, the municipalities religious and racial discrimination, the less Normandy landings. have run out of cash, and from teachers to were hardliners in the Papal Curia able to dustmen, everybody takes it in turn to come out Postwar he learnt diamond-cutting from on strike; the National Institutions have not obstruct reform. which he switched to the design and import sufficient means to tinance the vital development Though relatively few Jews now live in of imitation jewellery. Gradually he built up programme of land reclamation and settlement and, of course, the "Man in the Street' looks at all Catholic countries, John Paul II's concilia­ a workshop (with showroom) at Hatton the miracles from whipped cream to tory gesture will assuage some wounds in Gardens, but then a setback occurred: refrigerators, from Leberwurst to unrationed the collective psyche. Hopefully it will also several large stores withdrew their custom. butter, from lovely suits and dresses to Kaiser- Frazer cars, and cannot even scratch together the in future deter Catholic clergy from partici­ By fortunate coincidence a trader passing money to meet the ever increasing burden of pating in Le Pen rallies, Slovak and Croat through London asked him to store a batch income tax. ministers from honouring their Hlinka of Brazilian stones and sell any that he Probably people are afraid of admitting that in Guard or Ustashe predecessors, and Polish could.