Orthodox Jewish Group to Attend Meeting With Pope

The regional leader of a major organization of Orthodox Jewish congregations said Friday that he has received assurances from other Jewish leaders that Pope John Paul II will be questioned about the Vatican’s relationship with Israel when he visits the United States later this year.

As result, delegates from the Orthodox organization have agreed to attend an interfaith meeting with the pontiff in Los Angeles after all.

Rabbi Alan Kalinsky, Southern California director of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America, had earlier written the Board of Rabbis of Southern California that his group would stay away from the Sept. 16 meeting unless the pontiff agreed to discuss diplomatic recognition of Israel and the Vatican’s record during the Holocaust.

Kalinsky said Friday that he regretted that the letter had become public.

“Unfortunately, someone leaked the contents of an internal discussion among Jewish groups to the press, which should not have been done,” Kalinsky said. “It was a private discussion. . . . There was room for give and take in discussion with the leadership of the Jewish community.”

The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations is composed of about 1,200 congregations in the United States and Canada, including 12 in Southern California. Though it is the largest congregational Orthodox group, the union does not speak for all within the Orthodox wing of Judaism.

“Kalinsky called Monday to reassure me that my response had taken care of his apprehensions,” Rabbi Alfred Wolf, retired chief rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Reform Temple, said Friday. Wolf added that he had written Kalinsky that the subjects of the Holocaust and recognition of Israel will be taken up during the pontiff’s scheduled meeting with 200 national Jewish leaders in Miami on Sept. 11, the first stop in John Paul’s nine-city U.S. visit.

Reports Published

Wolf, a major spokesman for Jewish-Catholic relations in Southern California, said Kalinsky contacted him after news reports of the threatened action by Kalinsky’s group were published last week.

The Los Angeles meeting will be in the Japanese Cultural Center and will be mainly a ceremonial exchange between the Pope and 400 Southern California representatives of the Jewish, Hindu, Muslim and Buddhist faiths. The 45-minute format will not allow time for substantive discussions, according to Msgr. Royale Vadakin, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles official in charge of the meeting.