Vatican Supports Two-State Solution

[cmforte]

So there must have been some misunderstanding because you surely
accept what the Church teaches regarding the Jewish people:

from ROMANS 11:

"God’s Irrevocable Call.*

25 I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers, so that you will not become wise [in] your own estimation: a hardening has come upon Israel in part, until the full number of the Gentiles comes in,

26and thus all Israel will be saved, as it is written:

“The deliverer will come out of Zion,

he will turn away godlessness from Jacob;

27and this is my covenant with them

when I take away their sins.”

28 In respect to the gospel, they are enemies on your account; but in respect to election, they are beloved because of the patriarchs.

29 For the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable.

“Triumph of God’s Mercy.”

You mean this teaching (from vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P29.HTM) :

839 "Those who have not yet received the Gospel are related to the People of God in various ways."325
The relationship of the Church with the Jewish People. When she delves into her own mystery, the Church, the People of God in the New Covenant,** discovers her link with the Jewish People**,326 "the first to hear the Word of God."327 The Jewish faith, unlike other non-Christian religions, is already a response to God’s revelation in the Old Covenant. To the Jews “belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ”,328** "for the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable."329**

840 and when one considers the future, God’s **People of the Old Covenant and the new People of God tend towards similar goals: **expectation of the coming (or the return) of the Messiah. But one awaits the return of the Messiah who died and rose from the dead and is recognized as Lord and Son of God; the other awaits the coming of a Messiah, whose features remain hidden till the end of time; and the latter waiting is accompanied by the drama of not knowing or of misunderstanding Christ Jesus.

---

Yes. What is the relevance here? None of that says that all non-Jews are sercretly anti-Semitic and would start a renewed persecution against them if given the chance, causing them to need the protection of their own State.

-Chris

 

[RICKY_RASPER]

You mean this teaching (from vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P29.HTM) :

839 "Those who have not yet received the Gospel are related to the People of God in various ways."325
The relationship of the Church with the Jewish People. When she delves into her own mystery, the Church, the People of God in the New Covenant,** discovers her link with the Jewish People**,326 "the first to hear the Word of God."327 The Jewish faith, unlike other non-Christian religions, is already a response to God’s revelation in the Old Covenant. To the Jews “belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ”,328** "for the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable."329**

840 and when one considers the future, God’s **People of the Old Covenant and the new People of God tend towards similar goals: **expectation of the coming (or the return) of the Messiah. But one awaits the return of the Messiah who died and rose from the dead and is recognized as Lord and Son of God; the other awaits the coming of a Messiah, whose features remain hidden till the end of time; and the latter waiting is accompanied by the drama of not knowing or of misunderstanding Christ Jesus.

---

Yes. What is the relevance here? None of that says that all non-Jews are sercretly anti-Semitic and would start a renewed persecution against them if given the chance, causing them to need the protection of their own State.

-Chris

Hi Chris,
you are right when you say that not all non-Jews are anti-Semitic. But according to the scriptures all of the Nations will become anti-Semitic by virtue of the fact that they will all wage war on Israel.

  "Behold, the Day of the LORD is coming,   **(the second coming)**
   And your spoil will be divided in your midst.  
   For I  will gather **all the nations to battle
   against Jerusalem"**
   (Zechariah 14:1-2)

Here is a warning as to why you should not support dividing the land of Israel. I say support because according to scripture it’s going to happen and God will condemn those who divide it and those who support those who divide it !

  "For behold, in those days and at that time,
   When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem,  (sometime after 1948)
   I will also gather ALL nations,
   And bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat;  **(outside Jerusalem in Hebrew            means God Judges)**
   And I will enter into judgment with them there
   On account of My people, My heritage Israel,
   Whom they have scattered among the nations;
   They have also **DIVIDED up My Land**."  (Israel)
   (Joel 3:1-2)

I don’t mean this as a personal criticism of Catholicism but the
understanding of prophesy by the laity seems to be very poor.
Just as the understanding of Sacramental Spirituality is poorly
understood by Protestantism.
Your Brother in Christ,
Richard.

 

[cmforte]

Hi Chris,
you are right when you say that not all non-Jews are anti-Semitic. But according to the scriptures all of the Nations will become anti-Semitic by virtue of the fact that they will all wage war on Israel.

  "Behold, the Day of the LORD is coming,   **(the second coming)**
   And your spoil will be divided in your midst.  
   For I  will gather **all the nations to battle
   against Jerusalem"**
   (Zechariah 14:1-2)

Here is a warning as to why you should not support dividing the land of Israel. I say support because according to scripture it’s going to happen and God will condemn those who divide it and those who support those who divide it !

  "For behold, in those days and at that time,
   When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem,  (sometime after 1948)
   I will also gather ALL nations,
   And bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat;  **(outside Jerusalem in Hebrew            means God Judges)**
   And I will enter into judgment with them there
   On account of My people, My heritage Israel,
   Whom they have scattered among the nations;
   They have also **DIVIDED up My Land**."  (Israel)
   (Joel 3:1-2)

I don’t mean this as a personal criticism of Catholicism but the
understanding of prophesy by the laity seems to be very poor.

I don’t agree with your interpretation of scripture. Or your interpretation of Biblical prophecy. Nor would I want to bring any of it into the Israeli-Palistinian conflict. I don’t like religious chuavinism on either side. No one has the right to claim exclusivity to the land they are a at odds over. And to me the modern state of Israel is no where near a renewed continuation of Biblical Israel.

And it is not a poor understanding of prophecy, it is simply a disagreement over its interpretation and desire not to have politics dictated by religious fanaticism, on either side.

-Chris

 

[cmforte]

I don’t mean this as a personal criticism of Catholicism but the
understanding of prophesy by the laity seems to be very poor.

Obviously our understanding of Scripture must be very poor too since we decide to be Catholics instead of Presbyterian.

-Chris

 

[RICKY_RASPER]

I don’t agree with your interpretation of scripture. Or your interpretation of Biblical prophecy. Nor would I want to bring any of it into the Israeli-Palistinian conflict. I don’t like religious chuavinism on either side. No one has the right to claim exclusivity to the land they are a at odds over. And to me the modern state of Israel is no where near a renewed continuation of Biblical Israel.

And it is not a poor understanding of prophecy, it is simply a disagreement over its interpretation and desire not to have politics dictated by religious fanaticism, on either side.

-Chris

So what is your interpretation of God’s Word when He say,s that He will bring **ALL THE NATIONS OF THE EARTH **to wage war against Israel ?

 

[RICKY_RASPER]

Obviously our understanding of Scripture must be very poor too since we decide to be Catholics instead of Presbyterian.

-Chris

Why are you being so hurtful and rude ?

 

[cmforte]

Hi Chris,
you are right when you say that not all non-Jews are anti-Semitic. But according to the scriptures all of the Nations will become anti-Semitic by virtue of the fact that they will all wage war on Israel.

  "Behold, the Day of the LORD is coming,   **(the second coming)**
   And your spoil will be divided in your midst.  
   For I  will gather **all the nations to battle
   against Jerusalem"**
   (Zechariah 14:1-2)

Here is a warning as to why you should not support dividing the land of Israel. I say support because according to scripture it’s going to happen and God will condemn those who divide it and those who support those who divide it !

  "For behold, in those days and at that time,
   When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem,  (sometime after 1948)
   I will also gather ALL nations,
   And bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat;  **(outside Jerusalem in Hebrew            means God Judges)**
   And I will enter into judgment with them there
   On account of My people, My heritage Israel,
   Whom they have scattered among the nations;
   They have also **DIVIDED up My Land**."  (Israel)
   (Joel 3:1-2)

I** don’t mean this as a personal criticism of Catholicism but the
understanding of prophesy by the laity seems to be very poor.**Just as the understanding of Sacramental Spirituality is poorly
understood by Protestantism.
Your Brother in Christ,
Richard.

The Catholic Church officially normally avoids speculating on Biblical prophecy, at least how it concerns Israel and the End Times. Perhaps because so many Biblical prophecy-conspiracy theorists had targeted it as the Whore of Babylon and the Pope the Antichrist. Knowing the sting of baseless and inflammarory charges, it avoids targeting others with those same charges.

-Chris

 

[cmforte]

Why are you being so hurtful and rude ?

How was that hurtful and rude? I was pointing out that the difference in our understanding of biblical prophecy is analagous to our difference in our understanding of Scripture.

-Chrs

 

[cmforte]

So what is your interpretation of God’s Word when He say,s that He will bring **ALL THE NATIONS OF THE EARTH **to wage war against Israel ?

It is actually quite complicated and has been discussed many times. But one thing you must realize: you can not take one or two lines of Scripture alone to support a claim. You must put it in the context of the rest of Scripture as well as Tradition.

-Chris

 

[Semper_Zelare]

This is one of the three or four areas where I have a different opinion than the Catholic Church does. And, I think it is one of the few allowable areas as well, as it is political.

I definitely agree with what Ricky Rasper has been saying about this. I believe that there are 22 or 23 Arabic Muslim states in the Middle East. Why should the ONLY Jewish state in the Middle East be divided into two? Making a small state even more small.

The Arab countries are equally to blame for the plight of the Palestinians. They don’t want the Palestinians living in their countries, any more than the Jews want them living in Israel.

However, there isn’t a solution in any of that. So, my solution would that the Palestinian state already exists: Jordan. Politicans have already said as much. So, this is definitely a legitimate school of thought. One that happens to agree with the actions of the Israeli settlers.

So, more simply. I don’t want to see a Palestinian state, unless it is in Jordan. And I want Israel to have all the land it currently claims.

 

[Matthew_Holford]

You defend the indefensible by condemning Israel for defending herself.

Do you honestly believe that it is all one-sided? You believe that it is simply a situation of the Israelis defending themselves against the Palestinians? Are you saying that the Jews of Israel only want to live in peace and harmony with the Palestinian peoples?

As far as Christians killing one another in Northern Ireland I have never seen it. I have seen and I mean seen terrorists killing Christians i.e rupublican and loyalist terrorists killing Catholic and Protestant Christians. Their have even been occasions when English troops have murdered Irish Roman Catholics, but* never, never* have I seen or heard of a follower of Christ kill another follower of Christ.

We both know you know what I meant. No one who commits wilful murder against others can be a true and genuine Christian. However, loyalists and republicanism are not solely political they also claim respectively to be Protestant and Catholic. Religion plays a big role in Northern Ireland’s problems. I do not, and have never, lived there. I do know a number of people from Northern Ireland and they tell me that in many people there it’s ingrained from the cradle for Protestants and Catholics to hate each other.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Your ignorance of sacred scripture is epic as is your understanding of biblical prophesy regarding the return of Jesus Christ and the role of the Hebrew people in it.
Since you believe the Jewish people aren’t going to heaven, then were do you think the six million who died at the hands of Christian Germany are ?

I believe what the Church teaches. Among other things- there is no salvation without baptism and there is no salvation without Jesus Christ.

As far as the eternal fate of the Jews killed in the holocaust, I don’t know. I do know there is no salvation outside of the Catholic Church. Now, we can’t always tell with our human eyes if someone dies inside or outside of the Catholic Church. It’s possible for someone to have a conversion experience, including a baptism by desire, that is not detectable to us, but is known to God (who knows all things).

Christ called all people, Jews and Gentiles, to follow him. Likewise, we must work for the conversion of all souls to the Catholic faith.

Pax and God bless.

 

[RICKY_RASPER]

I believe what the Church teaches. Among other things- there is no salvation without baptism and there is no salvation without Jesus Christ.

As far as the eternal fate of the Jews killed in the holocaust, I don’t know. I do know there is no salvation outside of the Catholic Church. Now, we can’t always tell with our human eyes if someone dies inside or outside of the Catholic Church. It’s possible for someone to have a conversion experience, including a baptism by desire, that is not detectable to us, but is known to God (who knows all things).

Christ called all people, Jews and Gentiles, to follow him. Likewise, we must work for the conversion of all souls to the Catholic faith.

Pax and God bless.

St. Thomas Aquinas in Commentary on Epistle to the Romans:

“The blindness of the Jews will endure until the fullness of the gentiles have accepted the faith. And this is in accord with what the Apostle says below about the salvation of the Jews, namely, that after the fullness of the nations have entered, ‘all Israel will be saved’, not individually as at present, but universally.” …

“What, I say, will such an admission effectuate, if not that it bring the Gentiles back to life? The Gentiles would be the believers whose faith has grown cold, or even that the totality, deceived by the Antichrist, fall and are restored to their pristine fervor by the admission of the Jews.”

St. Jerome, Comm. to the Song of Songs, Homily 1:

“Their sins occasioned the salvation of the Gentiles and again the incredulity of the Gentiles will occasion the conversion of Israel. You will find both in the Apostle (St. Paul).”

St. John Damascene:

De Fide Orthodoxa (IV, 26, “Concerning the Antichrist”):

It should be known that the Antichrist is bound to come. Every one, therefore, who confesses not that the Son of God came in the flesh and is perfect God and became perfect man, after being God, is Antichrist. But in a peculiar and special sense he who comes at the consummation of the age is called Antichrist. First, then, it is requisite that the Gospel should be preached among all nations, as the Lord said, and then he will come to refute the impious Jews…
But Enoch and Elias the Thesbite shall be sent and shall turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, that is, the synagogue to our Lord Jesus Christ and the preaching of the apostles: and they will be destroyed by him. And the Lord shall come out of heaven, just as the holy apostles beheld Him going into heaven, perfect God and perfect man, with glory and power, and will destroy the man of lawlessness, the son of destruction, with the breath of His mouth. Let no one, therefore, look for the Lord to come from earth, but out of Heaven, as He himself has made sure.

Pope St. Gregory the Great:

Moralia in Iob (Preface, X, 20):
“After the loss of Job’s possessions, after all his bereavements, after all the suffering of his wounds, after all his angry debates, it is good that he is consoled by twofold repayment. In just this way does the holy church, while it is still in this world, receive twofold reward for the trials it sustains, when all the gentile nations have been brought into its midst, at the end of time, and the church converts even the hearts of the Jews to its cause. Thus it is written, ‘Until the fulness of nations enters and so all Israel is saved.’”

Theodoret:

“Paul insists that only a part of Israel has been hardened, for many of them believe. He thus encourages them not to despair that others will be saved as well. After the Gentiles accepted the gospel, the Jews would believe, when the great Elijah would come to them and bring them the doctrine of the faith. The Lord himself said as much: ‘Elijah will come and will restore all things.’”

salvationisfromthejews.com/endtimes.html

 

[chosen_people]

I support a Christian majority of Holy Land.

No Jewish Government. No Islamic Government. Christian

That’ll end the bs.

Yes, perhaps a privilegia de non tolerandis Judaeis for Jerusalem.

 

[Dan_Daly]

St. Thomas Aquinas in Commentary on Epistle to the Romans:

“The blindness of the Jews will endure until the fullness of the gentiles have accepted the faith. And this is in accord with what the Apostle says below about the salvation of the Jews, namely, that after the fullness of the nations have entered, ‘all Israel will be saved’, not individually as at present, but universally.” …

“What, I say, will such an admission effectuate, if not that it bring the Gentiles back to life? The Gentiles would be the believers whose faith has grown cold, or even that the totality, deceived by the Antichrist, fall and are restored to their pristine fervor by the admission of the Jews.”

St. Jerome, Comm. to the Song of Songs, Homily 1:

“Their sins occasioned the salvation of the Gentiles and again the incredulity of the Gentiles will occasion the conversion of Israel. You will find both in the Apostle (St. Paul).”

St. John Damascene:

De Fide Orthodoxa (IV, 26, “Concerning the Antichrist”):

It should be known that the Antichrist is bound to come. Every one, therefore, who confesses not that the Son of God came in the flesh and is perfect God and became perfect man, after being God, is Antichrist. But in a peculiar and special sense he who comes at the consummation of the age is called Antichrist. First, then, it is requisite that the Gospel should be preached among all nations, as the Lord said, and then he will come to refute the impious Jews…
But Enoch and Elias the Thesbite shall be sent and shall turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, that is, the synagogue to our Lord Jesus Christ and the preaching of the apostles: and they will be destroyed by him. And the Lord shall come out of heaven, just as the holy apostles beheld Him going into heaven, perfect God and perfect man, with glory and power, and will destroy the man of lawlessness, the son of destruction, with the breath of His mouth. Let no one, therefore, look for the Lord to come from earth, but out of Heaven, as He himself has made sure.

Pope St. Gregory the Great:

Moralia in Iob (Preface, X, 20):
“After the loss of Job’s possessions, after all his bereavements, after all the suffering of his wounds, after all his angry debates, it is good that he is consoled by twofold repayment. In just this way does the holy church, while it is still in this world, receive twofold reward for the trials it sustains, when all the gentile nations have been brought into its midst, at the end of time, and the church converts even the hearts of the Jews to its cause. Thus it is written, ‘Until the fulness of nations enters and so all Israel is saved.’”

Theodoret:

“Paul insists that only a part of Israel has been hardened, for many of them believe. He thus encourages them not to despair that others will be saved as well. After the Gentiles accepted the gospel, the Jews would believe, when the great Elijah would come to them and bring them the doctrine of the faith. The Lord himself said as much: ‘Elijah will come and will restore all things.’”

salvationisfromthejews.com/endtimes.html

Nothing in anything you posted says anyone, Jewish or otherwise, can be saved without baptism or without believing in Jesus Christ.

Yes, not all Jews were hardened to Christ. Those that weren’t…became Christians.
Yes the conversion of the Jews is one of the signs of the End Times, and yes Elijah (and Enoch) will return as prophets.

Someone who is Jewish can be saved the same way as someone who is Muslim or Buddhist or athiest can be saved…become Catholic.

Pax and God bless.

 

[Dan_Daly]

Just to clarify, not all Catholics go to heaven. But everyone who is in heaven is Catholic.

Pax

 

[Tsuwano]

The premise that every cultural group should be a sovereign nation is a dangerous one to take. On that premise, England should let the Scots and Welsh go, while the USA would…never mind.

I’m not sure that anybody presently in the ME is acting in good faith, and that’s the real problem, not what people 2,000 or 7,000 miles away say.

ICXC NIKA

England doesn’t own Scotland and never has. Scotland defeated England in her wars of independence and in the end, it was a king of Scotland, James VI, who wore the English crown after the death of Elizabeth I. The Stuart line was a Scottish line, not an English one.

 

[Tsuwano]

I also support a Palestinian State and feel that, in the long run, such a state would be better for Israel. It will happen sooner or later. I think it is in Israel’s interest if it happened sooner.

 

[Caldera]

Even with a long history of persecution, what is Israel like today?
youtube.com/watch?v=lPxTtucLNIg

I agree with a two-state solution, but unless the Palestinians accept Israel’s right to exist and stop their acts of violence, then it won’t solve anything.

 

[someguy14]

I agree that Palestinians should get their own state, in Iran.