A conversation with Rabbi Abraham Skorka

By Richard Price, CJD Committee Member

We asked Rabbi Abraham Skorka a few questions about how his 25-year friendship and dialogue with Pope Francis developed and flourished. Here’s what he had to say.

Q: Rabbi, from your early writings, it appears that interreligious dialogue was part of your persona long before you met Pope Francis. Why was this important?

One of the values that I learned from my parents and grandparents was that speech between people should reflect the way that people ought to relate to each other: with moderation, sincerity and honesty. Offensive words and physical aggression, I was taught, are not how we, as Jews, are supposed to act. In addition, those cultural and spiritual values, together with those of my rabbinical teachers, have guided me throughout my life.

Q: And yet with that background of values, was there not still a learning, a development process that propelled you on your path?

At the beginning of my Rabbinate, I had life-shaping encounters with Jewish leaders who were striving to create mutual understanding, even though some of them had suffered the horrors of the Shoah, a reality that has marked my being since childhood. The travails of the Jewish people took palpable form in my family, which was decimated by the massacre. What stays with me is the sadness that overwhelmed the members of my family and many members of the community of which I was a part.

Nevertheless, over the years, I discovered in the foundational texts of Judaism this same understanding of life my family had transmitted to me. I learned the existence expected by G-d for the people of Israel is one in which truth and peace are loved, that the ultimate destiny of history will be a world of peace. At the heart of Judaism is shalom – peace and wholeness reflected in a blessing that G-d taught the priests to impart.

Q: When and how did you actually begin the journey that led you to Pope Francis?

Seven years after the approval of Nostra Aetate in 1965, during my studies at the Latin American Rabbinical Seminary, I had a conversation with the founder of the institution, Rabbi Marshall Meyer. He was inspired by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who built a dialogue between Catholics and Jews. Rabbi Meyer gave me his teacher’s famous essay, “No Religion is an Island,” which was to have a great impact on me.

I found individuals whose experiences had led them — despite the Shoah, and 2,000 years of misunderstanding and hatred between Jews and Christians — to an imperative to create a turning point, a change in the antipathy that had caused so much pain. Nazism had perpetrated the Shoah based on an ignominious pagan creed, a mutation of the anti-Judaism that had permeated Christian Europe long before and to which many Christian theological writings had contributed.

Q: So how did this lead you to Pope Francis?

My first published writing about Catholic and Jewish dialogue, “Between Passover and Easter,” appeared in 1995 in the newspaper La Nación. I briefl y explained the intimate relationship between both observances and the theme of redemption they shared. Passover has always been a time for study and reflection about oppression for both the oppressed and the oppressors.

In subsequent articles, I demanded accountability for the terrorist bombing of AMIA, the headquarters of the Jewish community of Buenos Aires, in which 85 people were killed and hundreds injured. I also wrote about science, bioethical problems with euthanasia, interreligious dialogue and many, many others. In all these essays, I tried to engage pressing social issues from the ethical perspectives of the Bible and the Talmud, complemented by the vision that science offers.

Little did I know that these articles I wrote were being avidly read by the Jesuit auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires, Jorge Mario Bergoglio.

Q: Eventually you and Fr. Bergoglio met?

Yes, we began to have regular dialogues even as he was elevated to Archbishop of Buenos Aires. These encounters led to a deep and sincere friendship between us.

In the beginning, there were differences between our ages and positions. My title as seminary rector was hardly on a par with the archbishop of one of the most important Catholic communities in the world. It was he who overcame this disparity by unreservedly opening himself up to me. He paved the way. We not only began to dialogue but, most importantly, we began to work to spread the practice of dialogue in all aspects of our lives and responsibilities.

In 2004, I invited then Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, Archbishop of Buenos Aires, to come and deliver a message to my synagogue community, in anticipation of the day of Rosh Hashanah.

His message to my synagogue in 2004 went on to develop the idea of the encounter between the individual and G-d and of the importance of memory in that relationship. He alluded to the essence of Jewish belief expressed during this most holy season, the Days of Awe: to believe in the Creator who relates to each person and remembers each individual.

In fact, I was astonished to hear this sermon. Bergoglio’s message on this occasion could well have been the reflections of a rabbi to his community!

Q: So how would you characterize his attitude toward dialogue and the Jewish people?

His profound ability to identify with the Jewish experience was also evident in his instinctive understanding from the very beginning that dialogue between Catholics and Jews would become untenable if Catholics harbored any thought of “converting” Jews to Jesus Christ.

As he would say years later as Pope Francis, “There was a basis of total trust [between us] because we knew in our conversations — and I want to highlight this — neither of us negotiated our own identity. If we had, we would not have been able to talk. It would have been a sham. ... Neither of us attempted to convert the other.” I cannot overstate the importance of this sensitivity, which is a precondition for the mutually enriching dialogue that he and I experienced. Thank you, Rabbi Skorka.

ATTEND THIS EVENT

The Catholic Jewish Dialogue of Collier County is honored to present Rabbi Abraham Skorka. Brought to you by the Catholic-Jewish Dialogue of Collier County, Jewish Federation of Greater Naples and the Diocese of Venice in Florida, the program will take place in the ballroom of St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church.

WHEN: Sunday, April 3 at 3 p.m. Doors will open at 2:30 p.m.

WHERE: St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church ballroom (located in the building directly behind the church) - 625 111th Ave. N., Naples, Florida.

All are invited to purchase $18 tickets at www.jewishnaples.org. The last day to buy tickets online is Friday, April 1 at 9 a.m. If there are seats available on the day of the program, tickets will be sold at the door for $25 each.

Please read the weekly e-blasts for any updates and changes to the program.