Pope touts ‘unbreakable bond’ with Jews in visit to Rome synagogue

ROME — Pope Francis made his first visit to a synagogue as pontiff Sunday, greeting Rome’s Jewish community in their house of worship as his two predecessors did in a show interfaith friendship at a time of religiously-inspired violence around the globe.

During a visit marked by tight security and historic continuity, Francis also rejected all forms of anti-Semitism and called for “maximum vigilance” and early intervention to prevent another Holocaust.

Francis joined a standing ovation when Holocaust survivors wearing striped scarves reminiscent of their camp uniforms were singled out for attention at the start of the ceremony.

Francis began his visit laying a wreath at a plaque outside the synagogue marking where Roman Jews were rounded up by the Nazis in 1943 and at another marking the slaying of a 2-year-old boy in an attack by Palestinians on the synagogue in 1982.

He met with members of the boy’s family and survivors of the attack before entering the synagogue, the seat of the oldest Jewish community in the Diaspora.

Evoking “the unbreakable bond between Jews and Christians,” the pope delivered a message of peace.

“Violence against men is in contradiction with any religion worthy of the name, and in particular the big monotheist religions,” he said.

Pope Francis makes his first visit to a synagogue as pope, greeting Rome’s Jewish community in their house of worship as his two predecessors did in a show interfaith friendship at a time of religiously-inspired violence around the globe, on January 17, 2016. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

The visit comes amid a spate of Islamic extremist attacks in Europe, Africa and elsewhere, and Francis was expected to denounce all violence committed in the name of God as he has done on several occasions.

“The hatred that comes from racism and bias or worse which uses God’s name or words to kill deserves our contempt and our firm condemnation,” Ruth Dureghello, president of the Rome’s Jewish community, said in introductory remarks.

Francis’ visit is meant to continue the tradition of papal visits that began with St. John Paul II in 1986 and continued with Benedict XVI in 2010. It also highlighted the 50th anniversary of the landmark shift in Christian-Jewish relations that was represented by the Second Vatican Council.

Pope Francis, flanked by Rabbi Riccardo Di Segni, right, during his first visit to a synagogue as pope on January 17, 2016. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

The council document “Nostra Aetate” revolutionized the Catholic Church’s relations with Jews by among other things repudiating the centuries-old charge that Jews as a whole were responsible for the death of Christ.

The Argentine Jesuit has a longstanding friendship with the Jewish community in Argentina from his time as archbishop of Buenos Aires.