VATICAN CITY — The Vatican, bowing to the growing furor over Pope Benedict XVI’s decision to accept a return to the church of a prelate who denied the Holocaust, made a dramatic turnaround Wednesday and demanded that the bishop recant.
The Vatican sought to distance the pope from the controversy by saying he did not know about British Bishop Richard Williamson’s views when he agreed to lift his excommunication last month.
The controversy raised questions about the advice the pope receives and his access to information. Papal aides say Benedict, a former university professor and theologian, receives a daily news summary and occasionally watches television.
The statement was issued by the Vatican’s secretariat of state a day after German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged the pope to make a clearer rejection of Holocaust denials.
Williamson was shown on Swedish state television just days before the lifting of his excommunication was announced Jan. 24, acknowledging his view that “there was not one Jew killed by the gas chambers” during World War II.
The controversy threatened to mar Benedict’s strong record in building Catholic-Jewish relations, which included visits to the Nazi Auschwitz death camp in Poland and synagogues in Germany and the United States.
