Acta Apostolicae Sedis - Commentarium Officiale168

earliest days of Christianity, our identity and every aspect of our life and

worship have been intimately bound up with the ancient religion of our

fathers in faith.

The two-thousand-year history of the relationship between Judaism

and the Church has passed through many different phases, some of them

painful to recall. Now that we are able to meet in a spirit of reconciliation,

we must not allow past difficulties to hold us back from extending to one

another the hand of friendship. Indeed, what family is there that has not

been troubled by tensions of one kind or another? The Second Vatican

Council's Declaration Nostra Aetate marked a milestone in the journey

towards reconciliation, and clearly outlined the principles that have gover-

ned the Church's approach to Christian-Jewish relations ever since. The

Church is profoundly and irrevocably committed to reject all anti-Semi-

tism and to continue to build good and lasting relations between our two

communities. If there is one particular image which encapsulates this com-

mitment, it is the moment when my beloved predecessor Pope John Paul II

stood at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, pleading for God's forgiveness

after all the injustice that the Jewish people have had to suffer. I now

make his prayer my own: "God of our fathers, you chose Abraham and

his descendants to bring your Name to the Nations: we are deeply sadde-

ned by the behaviour of those who in the course of history have caused

these children of yours to suffer, and asking your forgiveness we wish to

commit ourselves to genuine brotherhood with the people of the Cove-

nant".2

The hatred and contempt for men, women and children that was ma-

nifested in the Shoah was a crime against God and against humanity. This

should be clear to everyone, especially to those standing in the tradition of

the Holy Scriptures, according to which every human being is created in

the image and likeness of God.3 It is beyond question that any denial or

minimization of this terrible crime is intolerable and altogether unaccepta-

ble. Recently, in a public audience, I reaffirmed that the Shoah must be "a

warning for all against forgetfulness, denial or reductionism, because vio-

lence committed against one single human being is violence against all".4

2 26 March 2000. 3 Gen 1:26-27. 4 28 January 2009.