Passionate Moderation

Recently the Jesuit Institute hosted Jerusalem-based Rabbi David Rosen, one of the leading figures in the interfaith movement, who once ministered to a congregation in the Cape. He spoke about the growth in the relationship between the Jewish and Catholic communities, particularly during the pontificate of John Paul II. He pointed to the understanding that now exists between our two faiths as an example of how interreligious dialogue can heal even the most damaged of relationships.

As he was talking I was reminded of a talk by Adam Habib, the rector of the University of Johannesburg and a devout Muslim. He was talking of the need for a voice from the ‘silent majority’ of religious people of faith, those who value tolerance and understanding as part of our faith’s expression. Habib was asking us to provide a strong moderate religious voice. Rabbi Rosen called this attitude ‘passionate moderation’.

All too often, he said, we only hear the voices at the extremist fringes of our religions, for example the fundamentalists for whom everything is either, black or white, in or out, and violence is too often justified by half-baked beliefs.

This call to a passionate moderation is one that I resonate with. But having grown up under Pope John Paul’s pontificate, I don’t think I fully realised how groundbreaking the reconciliation with the Jewish people was. As I listened to Rabbi Rosen I was struck by how significant the Pope’s visit to Israel in 2000 was for that country and for the international Jewish community. Gestures such as the Pope’s prayer at the Western Wall and his recognition of Catholic guilt in anti-Semitism would have been impossible to imagine before the Second Vatican Council with its revolutionary document on Christian/Jewish relations, Nostra Aetate.

As Israel and Palestine approach yet another round of peace talks this week, the image of the Pope kneeling in prayer seems to me one of profound hope. If two religions can recover from centuries of hatred and violence and find the beginnings of reconciliation, as have Judaism and Catholicism, then there is hope even for the current peace process.

Vital in any process of reconciliation, is repentance and the honest recognition of what has happened and of one’s own blindness and culpability. When I reflect on the Truth and Reconciliation Process in South Africa, I think that we can underestimate its significance for our healing process. There is a fundamental human need to be given the space to tell one’s own story of suffering and injustice and be listened to in an accepting environment. And for real reconciliation there needs also at some point to be an acknowledgment of guilt and responsibility.

It is significant that these talks are happening now, during Ramadan and in the lead up to Yom Kippur, when people of faith are more open to the interior working of God’s peace. Let those of us who are tied by bonds of faith in the one God pray with all those in the peace process, that with the help of passionate moderation, some steps towards a resolution to the ongoing violence in the Middle East may be made.