Non-Catholics need to respect the powerful symbolism of the papacy. But neutrality about a genocidal struggle against Israel’s existence is neither moral nor acceptable.
In an era when religion seems to be in steep decline throughout Europe and North America, it might strike some people as curious that the election of a new pope would be treated as such an earth-shaking event. But even as secularism increasingly dominates public discourse, the persistence of faith and the attention devoted to the leadership of a denomination so integral to the history of Western civilization as Catholicism is a reminder that some things transcend popular culture—and that is something all people of goodwill should celebrate.
So, it is understandable that the accession of Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, should be greeted with universal respect. That should also apply to the Jewish community, which now approaches the papacy with the sort of expectations of understanding and support that would have been unimaginable before the second half of the 20th century. The question is not where the church stands on the points of contention of the past, but how its spiritual leadership will be deployed in the present.
Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s much-quoted comment, in which he derisively asked “how many divisions” the pope had in his time, is generally and rightfully thought of as a clueless dismissal of the power that can stem from spiritual leadership. The Catholic Church and its new leader face many challenges, not least the fact that a growing percentage of its estimated 1.4 billion believers are in the Third World rather than Europe or the United States. It must also grapple with the conflicting demands that it be more accessible and modern while at the same time staying true to its core doctrines.