THE PAPAL VISIT : 3 Key Rabbis Will Boycott L.A. Meeting With the Pope

Most Los Angeles Jewish leaders said Thursday they will attend an interfaith ceremony with Pope John Paul II, but three prominent rabbis turned down their invitations, citing their continuing dissatisfaction with the pontiff’s controversial audience granted to Austrian President Kurt Waldheim.

The Southern California Board of Rabbis, which is coordinating the Jewish representation at the Sept. 16 event, voted overwhelmingly to participate in order to acknowledge “the significant accomplishments” that have come from the long Jewish-Catholic dialogue in this country.

“We will have a full delegation. There will be no empty seats,” said Rabbi Harvey Fields, a spokesman for the Board of Rabbis. The board, acting for eight other organizations, said it will provide alternates to those who boycott the ceremony.

The first two rabbis to decline were Marvin Hier and Abraham Cooper, the dean and associate dean, respectively, of the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center.

A third rabbi, Abner Weiss of Beverly Hills, also said Thursday that he was turning down his invitation as a “matter of conscience.” His was the lone “no” vote at the Thursday morning meeting of the Board of Rabbis’ executive board.

Both the locally oriented ceremony in Los Angeles and a national meeting of Jewish leaders with the Pope in Miami scheduled for next Friday were imperiled upon news of the June 25 Vatican audience granted to Waldheim. The former United Nations secretary general has denied charges of complicity in Nazi war crimes in Balkan countries while serving as an officer in the German army.

Most Jewish organizations waited for the outcome of the unprecedented meeting Tuesday by the Pope with Jewish leaders to make their decisions on whether to take part in the meetings on John Paul’s 10-day U.S. pastoral visit which begins next Thursday.

The Synagogue Council of America and two Orthodox bodies held separate meetings in New York late Thursday to consider their actions but had no immediate announcement. Another 8 to 10 Orthodox rabbis in Los Angeles who have invitations to the local event delayed their decisions until they heard what stances their national bodies would take.

Rabbis Hier and Cooper, in a letter to Los Angeles Catholic Archbishop Roger Mahony, said it was with “deep regret” that they declined to attend. They said the Vatican failed “to express even the slightest remorse” over the Waldheim invitation and has “set in motion the escalation of this controversy when the Pope meets again with Kurt Waldheim in June of 1988 during his official visit to Austria.”

Of more profound concern to them, they said, was the “lost opportunity” by the Vatican to budge on its policy of not establishing diplomatic relations with Israel, one of the agenda items at last Tuesday’s meeting at the Pope’s summer home.

Weiss said in an interview that he was distressed that the Vatican has said little about the reasons for the Waldheim audience. “His explanation for the granting of the audience would have alone dealt with our concerns,” said Weiss, whose 820-family Beth Jacob Congregation is the largest Orthodox synagogue in the Western states.

The Board of Rabbis’ decision to attend, the officers said in a statement, “represents our acknowledgement of the continuing dialogue between Jews and Catholics here in the United States and, particularly, here in Southern California, and the significant accomplishments which have ensued.”

At the same time, the board said, “We remain deeply distressed by the Vatican’s refusal to recognize the state of Israel and its capital, Jerusalem. Of special concern to us is the Pope’s failure to address the moral implications” raised by the Waldheim audience. The American Jewish Congress and B’nai B’rith’s Anti-Defamation League have endorsed the two U.S. meetings with the Pope.

Earlier Thursday, Msgr. Royale Vadakin, the priest coordinator for the Los Angeles interfaith meeting, said that Muslim, Buddhist and Hindu leaders in Los Angeles, who also have 100 seats each, are “extremely honored, happy and enthusiastic about being part of it.”

The Pope often meets with representatives of non-Christian religions on his trips abroad, but the purpose in Los Angeles is to highlight the ethnic and religious diversity of the metropolitan area. The pontiff will also meet in Columbia, S.C., with the national leaders of Protestant and Eastern Orthodox churches.