The Vatican stood firm Tuesday on a decision to rehabilitate a Holocaust-denying bishop, even as Jewish leaders warned that the move will set back decades of Roman Catholic overtures to mend strained relations between the two faiths.
The Vatican joined Jews and fellow Catholics in condemning the British bishop’s assertions that no Jews died in Nazi gas chambers.
But the Vatican also said Richard Williamson’s ideas had nothing to do with the decision by Pope Benedict XVI to return him and three other traditionalist bishops to the fold.
The controversy over lifting the excommunication of Williamson came as people worldwide Tuesday marked an annual Holocaust commemoration.
The Vatican’s embrace of Williamson has incensed Jewish groups in the United States and Europe.
“This is an astounding departure,” said Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. “It violates all of the goodwill of Vatican II, where the church said that … the long history of hatred toward Jews, silence toward Jews during the Holocaust is a thing of the past.”
In an interview with Swedish broadcast shortly before the pope lifted his excommunication Saturday, Williamson said: “I believe that the historical evidence is hugely against 6 million Jews having been deliberately gassed in gas chambers as a deliberate policy of Adolf Hitler. I believe there were no gas chambers.”
He added: “I think that 200,000 to 300,000 Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps, but none of them by a gas chamber.”
Williamson’s comments drew condemnation from Catholic bishops in Italy and Germany and from his own order, the Society of St. Pius X.
The leader of the society, Monsignor Bernard Fellay, said in a statement that Williamson’s views did not reflect the society’s position. Fellay forbade Williamson from speaking publicly and asked the pope’s forgiveness for “the dramatic consequences” of the bishop’s remarks.
