WASHINGTON-Nearly 50 Catholic members of the U.S. House asked Pope Benedict for “clarification” on Friday (Jan. 30) about why he readmitted a schismatic bishop who has publicly doubted that 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.
The lawmakers, all Democrats, acknowledged the pope’s right to lift the excommunication of Bishop Richard Williamson and three others, but said they did not understand why the pope has not publicly repudiated his comments.
“This is too sensitive an issue to be handled without a direct repudiation of Bishop Williamson’s views,” the lawmakers said in their letter.
“As a spiritual leader and the head of the Catholic Church, we believe it is vital that you publicly state your unequivocal position on this matter so that it is clear where the Church stands on one of the most consequential events of the 20th century.”
The letter came on the same day that Williamson, a member of the breakaway traditionalist group Society of St. Pius X (SSPX), apologized to the pope for the “unnecessary distress and problems” caused by his “imprudent remarks.”
While the pope has recently condemned the Nazi genocide of “millions of Jews” and expressed his “full and indisputable solidarity” with the Jewish people, he has not explicitly repudiated Williamson’s denial of the Holocaust.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, a Connecticut Democrat who spearheaded the lawmaker’s Friday letter, said the pope’s silence on Williamson “makes the church look ambivalent” on the truth of the Holocaust.
“I don’t think he shares Bishop Williamson’s views, but it’s critical that he address the issue directly and leave no doubt,” DeLauro said in an interview. “The church has to be the leading force in fighting against genocide.”
The signers represent 47 of the 98 Catholic Democrats in the House; none of the 37 Catholic Republicans in the House signed on. DeLauro said she “wanted to move as quickly as possible” and did not have time to solicit Catholics on the other side of the aisle.
The letter also did not include the highest-ranking Catholic Democrat in Congress, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., nor any Jewish members.
“We were speaking as Catholics,” DeLauro said. “This was not an attempt to collect names from people who simply had an opinion about this.”
The pope’s ambassador in Washington, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, was not immediately available for comment. Sister Mary Ann Walsh, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, said, “The Holy Father’s recent statements are unequivocal in his repudiation of the remarks on the Holocaust by Bishop Richard Williamson.”
(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)
Williamson’s denials have caused a public relations headache for the Vatican, and has prompted angry rebukes from Jewish groups who have warned the pope that his silence is endangering decades of progress in Catholic-Jewish relations.
“The Holocaust is a verifiable fact and as people of good will would agree, one of the darkest chapters in our history as a human family,” the lawmakers said. “There are still thousands of people amongst us-Jews and non-Jews-who can attest through eye-witness accounts to the horrors of the Holocaust.”
Benedict has described his decision to cancel the 1988 excommunications of four SSPX bishops as an “act of paternal mercy” that would reaffirm both papal authority and the 1960s reforms of the Second Vatican Council that the schismatic bishops reject.
Founded in 1970 by the late French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, the SSPX is the most militant and vocal resistance group to the 1960s reforms. The four bishops were excommunicated when they were ordained by Lefebvre without the Vatican’s consent.
