Florida Catholic | Bishop Visits Rome

Bishop Dewane visits Rome, Auschwitz with rabbis

The bishop was part of select group that toured the concentration camp and visited Pope Benedict XVI.

ADELA GONZALES WHITE | SPECIAL TO THE FLORIDA CATHOLIC

Published: 10.19.07

Bishop Frank J. Dewane, right, leaves the Auschwitz concentration camp with other Catholic and Jewish leaders during a September tour. From left are Bishop Richard Sklba of Milwaukee, Rabbi Eugene Korn of the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding, Rabbi Tzvi Blanchard of the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership; Bishop Kevin Rhodes of Harrisburg, Pa., and Rabbi Irving (Yitz) Greenberg.
COURTESY PHOTO

VENICE | When Bishop Frank J. Dewane saw an immense pile of discarded little shoes, he imagined the children who once wore them and who perished in the crematoriums and gas ovens of Auschwitz more than 60 years ago.

How, he asked himself, could anyone doubt that the atrocities of the Holocaust took place when confronted with this heartbreaking evidence?

"Seeing all those tiny shoes — it shocks you," Bishop Dewane said. "You begin to see that what happened in Auschwitz was an industry set up to do away with people. Here was an assembly line not to produce, but in a sense, going in reverse to kill. I got a terrible feeling as I saw the cruelty that was inflicted on other human beings. Evil can be so present."

Bishop Dewane visited the concentration camp as part of a study tour Sept. 2-7 sponsored by the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding based at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn. The group included five U.S. Catholic bishops and three rabbis who traveled to Krakow, Poland, where they were joined by the chief rabbi, Michael Schudrich, and the archbishop of Krakow, Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz. The group then traveled to Rome, where the chief rabbi of Florence, Joseph Levi, joined them.

Rabbi Eugene Korn, director of the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding, said the trip was meant to allow the bishops and rabbis to experience the horror of the Holocaust, bring about understanding and further the relationship between the Catholic Church and the Jewish faith.

The bishops and rabbis spent four intense days together retracing the history of the Holocaust. They toured Oscar Schindler's factory, where hundreds of Jews were saved from Auschwitz, a story told in the major motion picture, "Schindler's List." The group visited old Jewish neighborhoods in Krakow where there was once a robust Jewish community. Today, only 200 Jews live in those neighborhoods. The group also visited the offices of Pope John Paul II at the archdiocese museum, where he worked when he was cardinal archbishop of Krakow.

After an emotional five hours at Auschwitz and Birkenau, the bishops and rabbis took time for prayer and discussion.

"Seeing the piles of shoes and other personal items of the victims, the gas ovens and the crematoriums teaches a greater understanding of what these victims went though," Bishop Dewane said. "Being with the rabbis, we had many discussions about evil and who cried out in response to the atrocities that were going on and who didn't. The world knew about it, but few were willing to do anything to stop it."

Rabbi Korn has a very personal connection to Auschwitz. His wife's entire family was exterminated in the concentration camp.

"The Nazis had a methodical plan for the 'final solution,' and they calculated how to save two-tenths of a penny for each person they gassed," he said. "This was the ultimate desecration of the sanctity of life."

Auschwitz housed a culture of death and the Nazis made it a fashion to kill, Bishop Dewane said.

"We need to fashion a culture of life so that we respect life," he said. "Man was created in the image of God and this is our basis for promoting the sanctity of life."

Rabbi Korn agreed.

"The challenge is to create a counter-testimony, to preach the message of life over death (and that) life is stronger than death," he said.

The bishops and rabbis also spent time talking about issues and concerns facing both faiths.

"We talked about attendance, how to make our beliefs alive and relevant to today's world, our young people and their faith response, as well as other things," Bishop Dewane said.

The group also traveled to Rome to present Pope Benedict XVI with the Nostra Aetate Wings of Peace Award, which the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding gives annually to a Jew and a Christian for fostering understanding between the two faiths.

This year, the center decided to give only one award to the pope because of his stature and special understanding of the Holocaust, Rabbi Korn said.

"As a German and a religious leader, the Holocaust is enormously present to him," he said.

One of the first things Pope Benedict did as pope was to visit Auschwitz, which Rabbi Korn said initiated a big change in the church toward improved Catholic-Jewish relations. Just recently, the pope met with the president of the World Jewish Congress. Their talks at the Vatican focused on interreligious dialogue, and the pope said the issue of Catholic-Jewish relations was very close to his heart.

The success of the trip, Rabbi Korn said, depends on how the participants take what was learned and implement those lessons in their respective faith communities at the pew level. But on a personal level, Rabbi Korn said he gained five new friends.

Sixty years ago, this kind of relationship between Catholics and Jews was unthinkable. Having attended several world conferences on social issues and interaction of faiths where differences were at issue, Bishop Dewane said today's dialogue should focus on what Catholics and Jews have in common for the good of all.

"We share the Old Testament in common," he said. "How do we use our social doctrine and Jewish beliefs to help one another? How do we cooperate to help our brothers and sisters, to care for the environment — God's creation?"

The Diocese of Venice has a long tradition of reaching out to the local Jewish community. Bishop Dewane plans to continue building the relationship and deepening understanding between the two faiths through events such as Yom Hashoah, an annual Hour of Remembrance for the Holocaust victims to be held at Epiphany Cathedral Parish April 13, 2008. The bishop will also participate in the Kristallnacht Convocation being held Nov. 4 at Temple Shalom in Naples. The diocese also cooperates with the Center for Catholic-Jewish Studies at Saint Leo University, northwest of Tampa, to further relations between the two faiths.

In addition to Bishop Dewane, the other bishops who traveled to Auschwitz with the tour group hailed from Connecticut, Louisiana, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Two of the rabbis were from New York City. The Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding based at Sacred Heart University was founded 15 years ago to bring together religious leaders and others to cultivate new relationships between Jews and the Catholic Church.

White is director of communications for the Diocese of Venice.

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Bishop Dewane visits Rome, Auschwitz with rabbis

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