Among the sexual perversions proscribed as criminal offenses in the moral code of the Torah are homosexual relations between males (Lev. 18:22). Talmudic law extends the prohibition also to lesbianism. Rabbinic sources advance various reasons for the strict ban on homosexuality, which is regarded as a universal law included among “the Seven Commandments of the Sons of Noah.”

• Torah

Weiterlesen: Homosexuality in the Torah

A Temple is a seat of Divine Presence. In Judaism, there are two Temples, one for the dimension of time, the Sabbath, and one for the dimension of space, the Temple in Jerusalem. Christianity adds a third, the Son of G-d incarnate in the nature of man.

• Judaism
• Jesus

Weiterlesen: The Foundations of Three Temple Theology

It seems to me that a Catholic cannot help but be a crass supercessionist unless he recognizes the value that keeping the Law of Moses can have for the Jew who would serve G-d as He revealed Himself through His Incarnate Son.

Weiterlesen: What is Supercessionism?

The history of the relationship between Israel and Christendom is drenched with blood and tears. It is a history of mistrust and hostility, but also - thank God - a history marked again and again by attempts at forgiveness, understanding and mutual acceptance...  Can Christian faith, left in its inner power and dignity, not only tolerate Judaism but accept it in its historic mission? Or can it not? Can there be true reconciliation without abandoning the faith, or is reconciliation tied to such abandonment?

• Jewish-Christian Relations
• Jesus
• Catholicism
• Torah

Weiterlesen: Reconciling Gospel and Torah: The Catechism

There are no disagreements between Judaism and Catholicism. Where their teachings diverge, it is because they apply to two different, well, let’s call them universes, two ways that human experience is unified (uni-verse, “turned into one”) in relation to G-d according to their respective covenants.

• Judaism
• Jewish-Christian Relations
• Catholic Jews
• Catholicism

Weiterlesen: Judaism & Catholicism: The Essential Difference

From Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger's Book 'The Promise':"The Church appears in Jerusalem, after Pentecost, as an "assembly" kahal in Hebrew, ecclesia in Greek. it is unthinkable that she would claim to replace Israel. She is not another Israel, but the very, fulfillment, in Israel, of God's plan..."

• Israel
• Jewish-Christian Relations
• Church
• Catholic Jews
• Catholicism

Weiterlesen: Cardinal Lustiger on the Jewish Church

The commandments of the Law of Moses require both interior and exterior acts. There are commandments which pertain to the heart (love of G-d, to love of neighbor, fear of G-d etc.) and commandments which pertain to the body (resting on the Sabbath, eating kosher food, etc.). Virtually all the commandments of Jesus relate to interior acts. True, he requires acts of charity. He requires us to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the sick etc. but that is because those acts bear witness to love. It is the love that he requires, and it has been said by Catholic saints that, without love, even such acts are meaningless.

• Judaism
• Torah

Weiterlesen: The Ceremonial Law as Acquired Virtue

The sanctification of the body is important because, as St. Paul points out in Romans 7, the law of sin, i.e., the impulse to sin, resides in the body.  The sanctification of the body through the repeated acts of obedience to the ceremonial law is directed to uprooting that impulse to sin.

• Judaism
• Torah

Weiterlesen: The Ceremonial Law Sanctifies the Body

Is the baptized Jew still a Jew? Is he still obligated to keep the Law? Didn't St. Paul say that he's not? The purpose of this article is to address these questions by examining some of the most relevant passages from the epistles of St. Paul. We will see that a careful reading of his epistles suggests that the very reason St. Paul gives for exempting the Gentile from the observance of the Law deepened the meaning of the Law and value of observance for the Christian Jew.

• Judaism
• Catholic Jews
• Torah
• Bible

Weiterlesen: St. Paul on Jewish Law and Catholic Jews

Are the laws of kashrut (the Jewish dietary laws) just empty, outdated rules, or do they serve a purpose in glorifying God for the Catholic Jew?

• Judaism
• Torah

Weiterlesen: A Short Meditation on Kashrut