Word: pontiff
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...Jerusalem Sins of Omission Sometimes it's what you don't say that hurts. Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the Middle East, including historic trips to the Western Wall and the Dome of the Rock, drew complaints that the German Pontiff had glossed over Nazism in a May 11 speech on the Holocaust. Muslim leaders also awaited an apology, for his hinting in a 2006 speech that Islam was violent and irrational...
...Benedict arrives in Israel during an eight-day visit to the Holy Land, his first since becoming Pontiff. The trip is a near carbon copy of one made by his predecessor John Paul II in 2000. The Vatican hopes to use the trip to build on its 44-year rapprochement with the world's Jews after centuries of conflict and persecution. During his papacy, John Paul became the first modern Pope to visit a synagogue, recognize the state of Israel and apologize for the role Christians played in the Holocaust...
Most troubling of all was Benedict's reinstatement of Williamson, a debacle whose full scope the Vatican seemed to recognize only the day after Merkel's upbraiding. The church demanded that Williamson recant his gas-chamber denial, and the Pontiff released a letter that deplored the strain between the church and the Jews resulting from his "mistake." He assured a visiting group of Israeli rabbis of his intent to deepen Catholic-Jewish relations and his belief that the Jewish people "were chosen as the elected people" to communicate fidelity...
Since papal conclaves have a cutoff age of 80 and tend to elect Popes from their own number, Benedict is likely to be the last Pontiff who can say, "We remember," and mean it literally. As the church's center of gravity moves southward, he may also be one of the last European Popes, and Jewish relations tend to be low on the radar of African and South American bishops. (One of the latter recently said the Jews own the media.) When Benedict is gone, says Abe Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League, "not only may Judaism...
...arrival of the papal plane at Ciampino airport, the wire reporter's C-plus grade for the Pontiff had been bumped up to a B-minus. Maybe it was the Israeli chardonnay served onboard. Maybe it was simply an acknowledgment that we - and the Pontiff - were safely back in Rome...