Commentary : There’s a Growing Love for the People Who Fathered Jesus : Israel: The New Year is a good time for Jews to acknowledge Christian theological changes toward them.

As Jews mark Rosh Hashana, the Hebrew New Year, which begins tonight with two days of introspection and prayer, we should consider the spiritual significance of the approaching Christian millennium.

The notion of linking the Jewish year 5760 with the Gregorian year 2000 may seem to some Jews absurd, even offensive. The millennium, after all, commemorates an event that has no religious significance for Judaism. Indeed, over the past two millenniums, Jews have resisted Christian attempts, often humiliating and at times violent, to persuade us to accept Jesus as the messiah. Our history of martyrdom until the Holocaust is largely a chronicle of Jewish refusal to be absorbed by the church.

Yet the approaching millennium is an apt occasion for Jews to begin acknowledging the theological changes that have occurred within Christianity, and especially the Catholic Church, since the Holocaust. No religion has ever undertaken such a radical and courageous reevaluation of a fellow faith as has Christianity toward Judaism.

The 1965 Vatican II declaration absolving the Jewish people of responsibility for the crucifixion has been followed by a series of church documents and educational policies that go far beyond mere repudiation of anti-Semitism. Contempt for Judaism is being replaced by appreciation for the “elder brother,” as Pope John Paul II calls the Jews. In the past, the church preached that the Jews were meant to wander and suffer as a sign of their rejection by God; now the Vatican recognizes the state of Israel and memorializes the Holocaust. As a monk in Jerusalem told me, the church is in the process of transforming itself from a center point of hatred for the people who rejected Jesus into a center point of love for the people who fathered Jesus.

True, the Catholic Church still envisions an end-time scenario in which the Jews, along with the rest of humanity, accept the Christian messiah. But unlike most of evangelical Christianity, the Vatican has quietly abandoned proselytizing aimed at Jews, who have rightly perceived those attempts as contempt for their spiritual legitimacy. Certainly misunderstandings between Jews and the Catholic Church persist. Each side, for example, has an opposing understanding of the Vatican’s role during the Holocaust. But by treating the church as a spiritual partner, rather than as a reformed criminal requiring constant monitoring for signs of recidivism, Jews will strengthen those Christian voices calling for a more profound self-examination.

In the past, Jews could hardly be expected to celebrate the existence of a Christian faith that proclaimed itself the replacement of Judaism. Even so, some Jews did try to accommodate Christianity in God’s redemptive plan. Through the centuries, lone rabbinical voices noted Christianity’s role in bringing monotheism to the nations.

Now those voices need to enter the mainstream. We should reciprocate the church’s overtures of recent decades and offer appreciation for the religion that has brought our biblical story to the world, giving us a common spiritual language with much of humanity. As millions of Christian pilgrims prepare to ascend to Jerusalem, we Israelis should welcome them as an intimation of the biblical prophesy that envisioned humanity gathering in Zion for prayer.

Jews and Christians have separate spiritual tasks, whose autonomy should be respected. The Jews see their role as particularistic, affirming God’s presence through a people’s historical journey. The Christians see their purpose as universalistic, bringing the message of a redemptive God to the world.

Yet each side has something to teach the other. Jews, for so long ghettoized and inward-looking, can learn from Christianity’s concern for the spiritual and material welfare of all human beings, not just its own faithful. Christians, for their part, can learn from Judaism’s rejection of the notion that everyone must follow a single faith.

The Christian-Jewish dialogue is one of the most compelling proofs that humanity is leaving this traumatic century a little wiser, a little better. In this holiday season, as Jews ask God for forgiveness from sin, we should accept the penitence of Christians and celebrate with them the persistence of faith in the God of Israel.