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Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan and six other Roman Catholic bishops from the United States will spend a day at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps later this month during a Jewish-Catholic study trip to Poland and Rome with three East Coast rabbis. I see (Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan) as a future cardinal and a very important leader of the Catholic community. - Rabbi Joseph Ehrenkranz,executive director of the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding at Sacred Heart University This is not the first time U.S. bishops have visited the Auschwitz-area camps, the largest of the Nazi-run camps during World War II. Some 1.5...

Just days before the start of classes this week, the trustees of a Conservative Jewish day school in suburban Detroit pulled the plug on its teachers' union. The controversial move followed an August 16 decision by the State of Michigan Court of Appeals, which said that teachers in religious schools throughout the state do not have the right to unionize. In the wake of the ruling, which came down in response to teachers seeking to unionize at a Catholic high school, the Hillel Day School of Metropolitan Detroit ended recognition of its own long-standing teachers' union. "Teachers can decide whether...

Jerrold Nadler's Two Faces on Terror By Jacob LaksinFrontPageMagazine.com | June 13, 2005Last Friday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing on the Patriot Act had already been adjourned, but Jerrold Nadler, the Democratic blimpish congressman from New York and one of the leftmost members of the House Judiciary Committee, was too wound up to care: “We are not besmirching the honor of the United States, we are trying to uphold it,” bellowed the hefty Nadler. By this, Nadler meant to defend his attacks on the alleged abuses of the (in fact) privileged  prisoners in Guantanamo Bay. Thanks to the efforts of the...

An exodus from the Promised Land has left Jewish religious leaders worried. Israeli youths, fresh out of their three-year mandatory army service, are leaving their strife-torn country and reaching India in droves in search of peace. More than 10,000 men and women make their way towards places like Manali, Dharamshala and Kasauli every year where they find peace in Hinduism, nature, and, sometimes, drugs. Many marry locals, convert to Hinduism and cut off all contact with family in Israel. “We find peace here. This is a nice place to unwind after facing hardships back in Israel which is facing a...

Prominent Jewish and Catholic leaders meeting in New York yesterday said the spirit of respect and cooperation between the two religions forged by Pope John Paul II is now so strong that it would continue beyond his papacy. "I am optimistic that what this pope has done for the last 26 years cannot be reversed," said Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Vatican council responsible for Jewish-Catholic relations. He added that "everyone can only be happy about the progress that has been made, which is so important for peace in the world." The World Jewish Congress is hosting the two-day...

In speeches and in open letters, respected rabbis and Hassidic leaders are calling upon Jews the world over to join the struggle against the government's plan to withdraw from parts of Israel. In speeches and in open letters, respected rabbis and Hassidic leaders are calling upon Jews the world over to join the struggle against the government's plan to withdraw from parts of the Land of Israel. In coming days, the Pikuach Nefesh organization, made up of rabbis opposed to relinquishing Israeli territory, will publicize a strongly-worded open letter calling upon rabbis and Jewish leaders worldwide to put pressure on...

Many leading rabbis in hesder yeshivas – which combine religious studies with military service – have lately endorsed appeals to their student-soldiers to shun participation in the implementation of the projected disengagement from Gaza and, more specifically, to play no part in evicting Jewish residents. This has instantly produced the expected political reactions, including demands from Labor's Amram Mitzna and Ophir Pines-Paz that special arrangements for hesder conscripts be abrogated. MK Matan Vilna'i (Labor) went a step further and urged in an Israel Radio interview last Thursday that the entire hesder framework be disbanded. There may be a kernel of...

A group of prominent right wing rabbis on Tuesday issued a potentially inflammatory public call on the government to fight terrorism more tenaciously and to heed no difference between civilian and combatant in battle. The call by West Bank, Gaza, and right wing rabbis from Israel proper, arrived just a few hours after an IDF strike in Gaza killed 15 people – all of them Hamas members, according to a Hamas spokesman. The group of rabbis, headed by former MK and Chairman of the popular Bnei Akiva youth movement Haim Drukman (National Religious Party), said the army's policy in Palestinian...

Leading rabbis, among them heads of hesder yeshivot and members of the Yesha Rabbis Council, issued a proclamation today stating that Israel's security needs override the welfare of Arab civilians living in the terror-infested Palestinian Authority. "There is no need to avoid hitting or even killing Palestinians who are not involved in terrorism when this will harm the efforts to defend Israeli lives," the statement reads. "Jewish Law provides that during war time, such as that which we are now experiencing, there is no difference between the populace and the army. If a danger arises to Israeli soldiers or to...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Several rabbis weighed in on Wednesday against Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites)'s idea for adding a distinguishing mark to driver's licenses that would be given to illegal immigrants, saying it harks back to Holocaust-era persecution of Jews. In an open letter to Arnold Schwarzenegger, six Los Angeles rabbis wrote that his suggestion for allowing undocumented aliens to obtain driver's permits with a special emblem denoting their immigration status would subject them to "scorn and ethnic discrimination." "You are a person of faith, an immigrant and one who has been a friend to the Jewish...

The Yesha rabbinical council of the West Bank and Gaza Strip issued a letter Wednesday attacking Likud ministers who support the disengagement plan and calling on them to oppose the plan in the Likud's internal referendum on May 2. The open letter called the Likud ministers "politicians who sell weakness and despair." The rabbis asked whether the ministers "agree that the children of Ophir Cohen's family, whose legs were cut off on their way to school and who have been rehabilitated and returned to Kfar Darom [a central Gaza Strip settlement], will be exiled from there, this time by Jews,...

Intelligence community officials have informed prominent rabbinical figures that they have been targeted by terrorists and instructed the rabbis to act accordingly. Chief Rabbis Yona Metzger and Shlomo Amar have been informed by intelligence community officials that they are potential targets for terrorists and must take the appropriate precautions. Also on the terrorists' lists are Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, former Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau and leading Kabbalist Rabbi Yitzhak Kaduri. Some of the rabbis have already made changes in their schedule in compliance with intelligence and security officials' recommendations. Rabbi Yosef, for instance, has canceled some of...

Why we are losing the 'gay marriage' battle Posted: February 24, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern Richard D. Ackerman © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com While everyone would like to claim that the homosexual "marriage" battle has energized the Christian majority in America, nothing could be further from the truth. The recent events in San Francisco and Massachusetts are the ultimate testimony to our lack of energy and desire to please God. We are currently losing this battle because we deserve to lose this battle. There are several reasons why we will not win this battle until we change our wicked ways. First, our...

Coming soon to a synagogue near you: "The Passion: The Counteroffensive." Jewish groups across the city are gearing up for the premiere of Mel Gibson's movie with sermons, forums and press conferences on the death of Christ. Their aim is to fight any suggestion that Jews - two millennia ago and today - are responsible for Jesus' crucifixion. "We are not into boycotts, but it's important to sensitize people to the concerns we have," said Joel Levy, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League. "The movie is a modern-day passion play, and passion plays historically have been the occasion for lots...

ISRAELI rabbinical authorities have given a man whose wife has been declared brain dead exceptional permission to take a second spouse, the Maariv daily reported Monday. The state of Israel normally forbids bigamy in accordance with the guidance of the Edict of Rabbi Gershom, a rabbinical text dating back to the Middle Ages. But if a woman is no longer of sound mind and cannot agree to a divorce, rabbis can authorise a second marriage. The paper said that the request had been submitted by a husband, who is in his late 50s, from a Jewish settlement in the northern...

Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger spoke with Arutz-7 this morning about his visit last week, together with Chief Rabbi Rishon LeTzion Shlomo Amar, with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican. He told of "immediate and wondrous results." Chief Rabbi Yonah Metzger spoke with Arutz-7's Uzi Baruch this morning about his visit last week, together with Chief Rabbi Rishon LeTzion Shlomo Amar, with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican. He said that the meeting had more historic value than practical value, "but we were told in advance that this would be the case. In the Vatican, there is no such...

MUCH ABOUT HISTORYIsrael seeks returnof Temple artifacts Rabbis urge Vatican to permit search of storerooms for treasures Posted: January 16, 20041:00 a.m. Eastern © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com When Israel's chief rabbis meet Pope John Paul II today, they will seek permission to search Vatican storerooms for artifacts such as the huge golden menorah that stood in the Temple in Jerusalem 2,000 years ago. Vatican officials confirmed to the Associated Press the meeting would take place but declined comment on the rabbis' request. Yehuda Metzger and Shlomo Amar are to have an audience with Pope John Paul, the first by Israel's chief rabbis in...

ROME, Jan. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- The two Chief Rabbis of Israel, Yona Metzger and Shlomo Amar, met today with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican to discuss the need for the world's religious leaders to help stem a rising tide of anti- Semitism and terror throughout the world and to continue to decry attacks on the very sanctity of life. It was the first time both chief rabbis met together with His Holiness. Both Rabbis called the 30-minute talk with the Pope "historic" and productive. The meeting was arranged by the Vatican's Ambassador to Jerusalem Henazio Puerto Sambi amid...

President Bush marked the Jewish New Year by telling a roomful of rabbis about his faith and how it helped make him a better man. Some 15 rabbis representing the three main denominations spent an hour at the White House on Monday discussing a range of topics, including Iraq, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, poverty and faith-based initiatives. Rabbi Steven Pruzanski of Teaneck, N.J., said Bush twice became emotional: while discussing his recent trip to the site of the Auschwitz death camp and when he talked about how people pray for him. Bush spoke openly about his drinking problem of years past,...

Maj. David Rosner, shown here in a C-130 tranport plane, has worked on both the military and post-war operations in Iraq. When Rabbi Mitchell Ackerson blew the shofar this past Rosh Hashanah, it reverberated throughout one of Saddam Hussein´s former palaces. More than 100 Jewish members of the U.S. forces stationed in Iraq attended the High Holiday services at the former Iraqi dictator´s Baghdad compound. They seemed shocked and awed, not least by the echo. "It was a 25-foot ceiling, so it really goes," Ackerson said, describing the shofar´s blast in a telephone interview from Baghdad on Monday. Many of...