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There is no doubt that Pope Benedict XVI is more of a fundamentalist in the Catholic community and now that he is the Pope, he seems to be taking Catholics to pre-Vatican II era. Pope Benedict XVI has revised the 1962 text of the Latin mass, retaining the rubric, ‘For the Conversion of The Jews.’ Why is he messing with this again, now? Maybe because he’s the Pope and has the power?

Prior to the Second Vatican Council, the Good Friday mass in Latin prayed for the conversion of Jews, referring to their “blindness” and calling upon God to “lift a veil from their hearts,” The Times recalled, adding that the newly revised prayer asks “Let us pray for the Jews. May the Lord Our God enlighten their hearts so that they may acknowledge Jesus Christ, the savior of all men.”

All religion(s) need to move away from their exclusivity and monopolistic paradigms when it comes to an individuals relationship with God.

The new version of the payer to be recited in the revived traditional Tridentine Latin liturgy for Good Friday petitions God to enlighten the hearts of Jews “so that they may acknowledge Jesus Christ, the savior of all men.” Most Catholics worship in the vernacular, according to The New York Times and their prayers will not be affected. But last year, the Pope made it easier for traditionalists to celebrate the Latin Mass that was the norm before Vatican II.

Listening to a language one cannot understand!

Needless to say, most Jewish rabbis are more than concerned: many are upset. “We have been very much involved in interfaith activities and dialogue for years, and relationships with the Catholic Church are really quite good,” the rabbi told the Times, “I think it really turns back the clock a bit and reverts to some sense that the church is pulling back from the positions it took in Vatican II.”

Religion, at least the spiritual, need not be mediated! We need the communities of faith, but we’ve given way too much power to MAN, in his various offices and official duties. MINISTER iused to be a VERB a few hundred years ago, but now the word MINISTER is a NOUN. How sad for the church.

We need to be bringing people together, not separating them. Let the Occidental and the Oriental live in peace together. Let the Catholics and Protestants live in peace together. Let none of us presume superiority over the other. What good does that do? Tell me, what good does that do? History is the record of the damage that it does and I am afraid, the Pope is taking a step backwards in this area.