T he Jew-hatred on display at some campus protests corresponds little with attitudes toward Jews in America. But today’s ill-informed protesters on the quad are tomorrow’s managerial elite. Many young Americans of privilege have lately turned not merely on Israel but on the Jewish people — and to judge from some of the depravity, like blindly ignoring evidence of sexual crimes committed by Hamas, it’ll likely get worse.
How should Catholic leaders and institutions respond to this moment, beyond carefully worded statements that neither offend nor teach? One instructive precedent, perhaps surprisingly, is the medieval papal bull Sicut Judaeis, which condemned antisemitic violence and even authorized excommunication for certain offenses.
Therein lies a tale. Excommunication in early Christianity usually entailed the denial of the eucharist and therefore denial of communion with Christ in the sacrament. The disciplinary practice eventually evolved into a formal ritual in the Latin Church. The fourth century, which began with Christians in the catacombs during the Diocletian persecution, ended with Ambrose excommunicating Theodosius for the killing of civilians in Thessaloniki.
Medieval pontiffs anathematized ever more liberally, often to check the conduct of Caesar. Perhaps the most significant check on state power came in the winter of 1077, when the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV stood penitent for three days in the snow until Pope Gregory VII, who’d taken refuge in a nearby castle, lifted the anathema. Excommunication could also be used against ordinary Christians, including those who persecuted Jews.
This suggestion might surprise. After all, medieval mob violence by Christians — which often bears a striking resemblance to the outbursts of anti-Christian violence in Egypt or Pakistan — was sometimes triggered by antisemitic canards such as the charge of deicide, or the blood libel. Such hatred also colored the Crusader ethos, shaped by the recently converted Norsemen. The resulting notion was thoroughly alien to the ancient Christian communities of the Near East and Mediterranean, which tended to adhere to merely defensive warfare if not pacifism. But as the Crusaders marched to Jerusalem, near-genocidal slaughters of Jews and others followed.
Yet Rome, relatively philosemitic, took notice of the slaughters. In 1120, Callixtus III issued the papal bull Sicut Judaeis (As for the Jews), drawing heavily from his predecessor Gregory I. The bull forbade Christians from harming Jews or their property, disturbing Jewish holy-day observances, vandalizing Jewish cemeteries, or coercing Jews to convert — all on penalty of excommunication. It was invoked by more than 20 popes, often tailored to specific antisemitic tropes, such as the blood libel, over four centuries. The last incorporation by reference of Sicut Judaeis appears to have come a few decades before the Spanish Inquisition.
Catholic institutions could, in the spirit of Sicut Judaeis, take a few practical steps to deter antisemitism. First, bishops could issue statements that define and condemn antisemitism. They might reprimand notorious Catholic antisemites. They might even revisit excommunication in this current context of Western antisemitism. Second, Catholic institutions could begin to explore the indirect harm that has resulted from supersessionist or replacement theology and to draw attention to authorities on the subject, from Saint Paul to Nostra Aetate to John Paul II.
Third, lay Catholics might undertake to understand the profound, ineradicable Hebraic roots of their own faith and culture. They might acquaint themselves with modern Israel and why its people are, despite generational trauma and constant conflict, one of the happiest in the world. Catholics might even study those habits of community and family life in Israel that could be replicated to revitalize the West, from pro-natalist trends (Israel has the highest birth rate in the developed world) to strict observance of the Sabbath to the benefits of mandatory service.
America meanwhile trends in another direction. Research points to a steep decline in empathy in young people, owing to technology dependence, impersonal media, and the absence of discipline. Many go to college with an empathy deficit — and there’s little evidence that they become less antisocial while there. It’s no accident that the protesters, especially at Columbia, dug in: They’re in one of the few counties in America that would suffer their antisemitism.
What they don’t seem to grasp is that people like them have appeared in every generation for millennia and that it has yet to end well. The Jewish people have outlived empires and entire civilizations, and so are likely to outlive Hamas and these protests. Today’s antisemites will be remembered by another name in liturgies and seders generations hence, and otherwise forgotten.
In the here and now, however, today’s hatred threatens only to fester and worsen without forceful response by non-Jews. Catholics are not, happily, the primary contributors to the rise in antisemitism. But Catholic leaders can do more to combat the scapegoating of Jews among Catholics and in the world — starting, perhaps, by dusting off medieval precedents. The moment calls for Catholic leaders to have at least as much moral courage as the medieval church.