Opening meeting of the Second Vatican Council in St. Peter’s Basilica, Rome, October 1962.
—Osservatore Romano servizio fotografico
2005 is the 40th anniversary of one of the most significant breakthroughs in Jewish-Christian relations, the ratification in 1965 by the Second Vatican Council of Nostra Aetate, the Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions. In its explicit repudiation of the centuries-old “deicide” charge that held Jews responsible for the death of Jesus, its condemnation of antisemitism, and its acknowledgement of the enduring validity of Judaism, Nostra Aetate opened a new era in interfaith dialogue.
Listen to the program
Roundtable discussion
December 7, 2005
Little is known today about the interfaith efforts during the 1950s that laid the foundation for Nostra Aetate or about the discussions in Rome between Catholic and Jewish leaders that had a profound influence on the final document. This panel will analyze the interfaith history of this document as well as its lasting legacy on interfaith relations and the fight against religious prejudice in the wake of the Holocaust.
This program has been made possible by the Hoffberger Family Fund.
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Committee on Ethics, Religion, and the Holocaust »
Related documents
Read Section 4 of Nostra Aetate »
Read the Vatican’s Official Translation of the full Declaration »
Special focus
Prejudice against or hatred of Jews — known as antisemitism — has plagued the world for more than 2,000 years. The Holocaust, the state-sponsored persecution and murder of European Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators between 1933 and 1945, is history’s most extreme example of antisemitism. Yet even in the aftermath of the Holocaust, antisemitism remains a continuing threat.
