Jewish Kaddish, Catholic Psalms at Notre Dame for Funeral of Jewish-born French Cardinal

The Associated Press, Thursday, August 9, 2007

PARIS: Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, who sought to bring Jews and Catholics together in life, is continuing the mission in death. In a funeral infused with symbolism, Jews will stand Friday in front of the sculpted saints of Notre Dame cathedral and recite one of Judaism's most sacred prayers moments before an archbishop reads psalms for the Jew who converted to Catholicism, became a towering figure in the church and was even touted as a possible candidate for the papacy.

Lustiger's own faith remained complex up until his death Sunday at age 80 in a Paris hospice. He never rejected his Jewish identity, and worked to heal wounds between France's Jews and Catholics. The longtime archbishop of Paris, whose mother died at Auschwitz and who was a confidant of late Pope John Paull II, asked that his funeral include both faiths. "This was his wish, to share the remembrance this way," Arno Lustiger, a cousin who is a German historian and Auschwitz survivor, told The Associated Press. Arno Lustiger, 83, will lead the reading of the kaddish mourning prayer, in Hebrew, in front of Notre Dame on Friday morning. A grandnephew, Gila, will read a psalm and message to the cardinal from his family, in French. Another relative, Jonas-Moses Lustiger, is bringing earth from Christian holy sites in and around Jerusalem to be sprinkled on the coffin. Shortly after the kaddish, Lustiger's successor as archbishop of Paris, Andre Vingt-Trois, will lead a funeral Mass inside the 12th century cathedral, one of the greatest symbols of French Catholicism.

Among those in attendance will be France's leading Jewish and Catholic figures, as well as President Nicolas Sarkozy. Sarkozy will interrupt his U.S. vacation to attend Lustiger's funeral, before jetting back to Maine for lunch the next day with U.S. President George W. Bush. Many of those attending the Mass are expected to attend the kaddish reading as well, the Paris diocese said. Rosita Ferrer, a Parisian waiting to pay her respects at Notre Dame on Thursday, said she wasn't surprised by the Cardinal's wish to honor his Jewish heritage. "It's a beautiful symbol," Ferrer said. "He did so much for the reconciliation of religions. ...He is leaving us a beautiful gift for years to come."

Aaron Lustiger was born in 1926 In Parish to Polish immigrant parents who ran a hoisery shop. As an adolescent, he was sent to the town of Orleans, 130 kilometers (80 miles) south of the capital, to take refuge from the occupying Nazis. There, Lustiger, who was not a practicing Jew, converted to Catholicism at the age of 14, taking the name Jean-Marie. He was ordained a priest in 1954, and served as chaplain to students at the Sorbonne University, reportedly zipping on a motorbike through the streets of the Left Bank student neighborhood. Lustiger climbed up the church hierarchy before becoming archbishop of Paris, a post he held for 24 years before stepping down in 2005.

Lustiger remained a grassroots figure, creating a Christian radio station, Radio Notre Dame, in 1981 and expounding on issues from the August 2003 heat wave that killed thousands of people in France to the building of a united Europe. He also respected his Jewish heritage. "Christianity is the fruit of Judaism," he once said. "For me, it was never for an instant a question of denying my Jewish identity. On the contrary," he said in Le Choix de Dieu (The Choice of God), conversations published in 1987.

Lustiger's post-mortem message of unity comes as the Vatican on Thursday sought to calm Jewish anger over Pope Benedict XVI's meeting with a prominent Polish priest accused of anti-Semitism, declaring the encounter did not imply any change in the church's desire for good relations with Jews.