Word: pontiff
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...welcomed Pope John Paul as a dramatic new personality on the world stage. The inevitable excitement about the first papal tour of the U.S. overshadowed the stern admonitions that John Paul delivered on church teachings and discipline. Since then, the Pontiff and Vatican officials have taken a number of widely noted actions to apply those admonitions. Some of the most controversial: temporarily limiting the authority of Seattle's liberal Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, firing the Rev. Charles Curran from his professorship of moral theology at the Catholic University of America, threatening nuns with expulsion for declaring that pro-choice opinions...
...astutely timed. The subject: the "terrible experience" of the Holocaust and its lessons for Christians. The three-page missive was addressed to Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis, president of the U.S. conference of Roman Catholic bishops, thanking May for sending him a newly published collection of the Pontiff's statements on Jews and Judaism. While the letter was ostensibly routine, its language was heartfelt. "Christians approach with fearsome respect the terrifying experience of the extermination, the Shoah, suffered by the Jews during the Second World War," wrote the Pope, "and we seek to grasp its most authentic . . . meaning...
...Pope's gesture seems to have cleared up concern about the atmosphere that would prevail there. "It was a thoughtful letter, one charged with emotion," said Theodore Ellenoff, president of the American Jewish Committee. Participants in next week's papal exchanges were also pleased. The Pontiff has asked for 90 minutes of open, frank dialogue on Catholic-Jewish relations, without set speeches. "We were told the Pope wanted a man-to-man, heart-to- heart discussion," said Rabbi Marc Tanenbaum of the American Jewish Committee. "We took it as a sign of good faith...
...Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, retaining some reservations. "Up to now, perhaps, Jews did not play an important role in the Pope's vision of the world." In fact, John Paul has made a number of significant overtures to Jews. His 1979 journey to Auschwitz was the first by a Pontiff to a concentration camp. His visit last year to a Rome synagogue made him the first known Pope to enter a Jewish house of worship since St. Peter. But last May he beatified a nun, Edith Stein, a convert from Judaism, as a heroic Christian martyr. Jews had protested that...
Nevertheless, the Pontiff surprised nearly everyone by addressing a question that even a Vatican spokesman said would not arise during the visit: diplomatic relations between the Holy See and the Jaruzelski regime. Speaking to Polish bishops shortly before his departure Sunday, the Pope for the first time called for the establishment of diplomatic ties. "In the case of the so- called Catholic country," he said, "the Holy See considers relations with a given state as a normal and right thing...