Interfaith effort seeks support

By Bernardo Benes

September 25, 2006

On Sept. 17, Miami Archbishop John Favalora held a mass in St. Mary's Cathedral in celebration of Pope John Paul II as a champion of the reconciliation between Catholics and Jews. Before the mass, a special brochure was distributed to the parishioners.

In the next few months, some 400,000 of these pamphlets will be handed out at Catholic churches and schools across South Florida, making it one of the most widespread grass-roots efforts ever to encourage better Judeo-Christian relations.

We can say with pride that it started here in South Florida, a place better known for division and strife since the 2000 presidential election.

This all started 14 years ago when cousins of mine in Charlotte, N.C., sent me the 96-page book A Letter to a Jewish Friend. It is a short history of the friendship between young Karol Wojtyla, the future pontiff, and Jerzy Kluger, a Jewish childhood friend. This book opened a window on why John Paul II placed such great emphasis on establishing a new relationship between Catholics and Jews.

When John Paul II died in April 2005, I attended his funeral as a simple Jew who wanted to pay respect to a giant of a man. While in Rome, I met with Jerzy Kluger, and that conversation made clear that John Paul II's respect and concern for the Jewish people was a lifelong interest.

Now we are proud to continue John Paul II's interfaith mission. I would have never thought that 18 months later I would have been able to witness the extraordinary mass given earlier this month by Archbishop Favalora, and the distribution of the pamphlet.

There were a number of pivotal steps along the way. First, with the help of Jaime Einstein and the Rev. Willie Arias, I drafted the text for a brochure encapsulating John Paul's views on Catholic-Jewish relations and history, an outlook that shaped his successful efforts to unwind centuries of ill will.

With the support of an old friend, Bishop Thomas Wenski of Orlando, I met in Washington, D.C., with Thomas Quigley and Dr. Eugene Fisher at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. The USCCB's review and acceptance of the brochure made it an official document of the Catholic Church.

I then approached Jim Howe, the executive director of the local chapter of the National Conference of Community and Justice, to ask for its participation; the executive committee, with Donald Bierman as president, accepted on the spot.

This past March, Archbishop Favalora enthusiastically accepted the idea of working with NCCJ. He appointed the Rev. Pat O'Neill to coordinate the program, and suggested that the NCCJ print 400,000 copies of the brochure in English, Spanish and Creole to be used as an educational tool against anti-Semitism.

All the efforts paid off with the mass. Archbishop Favalora's homily, before an audience that included many leaders of the Miami Jewish community, sounded the proper notes of harmony, communication, tolerance and outreach. A kosher lunch followed, with an invocation by Rabbi Solomon Schiff, executive director of the Rabbinical Association of Greater Miami.

I am committed to all necessary efforts to expand the program to other Catholic dioceses. To accomplish this, however, we need the support and help of Catholics and Jews.

As I look back to April 4, 2005, the day in which John Paul II passed away, I am very happy with the thousands of hours that we have invested in this program. We know that we are on the right path.

During the kosher lunch, a priest friend confessed that he originally doubted whether we could pull this off. He told me we were able to do this because God is with us.

And so, I am sure, is John Paul II.

Miami banker Bernardo Benes helped establish the Cuban Hebrew Congregation after arriving in Miami from Cuba in 1960