Did the Pope Pardon Himself in his New Book?

Yes, we think that the pope did in fact pardon himself for any guilt of the Holocaust in his new book. Here is how.

In 1965 the Catholic Church exonerated the Jews and declared in Nostra Aetate of Varican II:

...True, the Jewish authorities and those who followed their lead pressed for the death of Christ; still, what happened in His passion cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today. Although the Church is the new people of God, the Jews should not be presented as rejected or accursed by God, as if this followed from the Holy Scriptures. All should see to it, then, that in catechetical work or in the preaching of the word of God they do not teach anything that does not conform to the truth of the Gospel and the spirit of Christ.

Furthermore, in her rejection of every persecution against any man, the Church, mindful of the patrimony she shares with the Jews and moved not by political reasons but by the Gospel's spiritual love, decries hatred, persecutions, displays of anti-Semitism, directed against Jews at any time and by anyone.

Besides, as the Church has always held and holds now, Christ underwent His passion and death freely, because of the sins of men and out of infinite love, in order that all may reach salvation. It is, therefore, the burden of the Church's preaching to proclaim the cross of Christ as the sign of God's all-embracing love and as the fountain from which every grace flows.

That was then, 45 years ago. This is now.

Pope Benedict XVI, declares in his new book that, it was the "Temple aristocracy" who did it to Jesus, not all Jews of all times.

AOL cites the Catholic News Service:

 In one of the excerpts, Benedict takes up a key reference to "the Jews" in John's Gospel, saying it actually referred to the "temple aristocracy," the Catholic News Service reports.

"Now we must ask: Who exactly were Jesus' accusers? Who insisted that he be condemned to death?" the pope wrote.

"But John's use of this expression does not in any way indicate -- as the modern reader might suppose -- the people of Israel in general, even less is it 'racist' in character. After all, John himself was ethnically a Jew, as were Jesus and all his followers," Benedict wrote.

What St. John was referring to with the term "the Jews," the pope said, was the "temple aristocracy," the dominant priestly circle that had instigated Jesus' death.

When the Pope denies the "racist" character of the Gospels, he tips his hand to us.

Indeed, this pope knows racism. As a German boy he was a member of the Hitler Youth. Now by implication he claims to be an innocent German who is not to be held responsible for the "racist" Nazi aristocracy, the dominant circle who instigated the Holocaust.

Did the pope just make a theological slip?

Does the way the pope pardons the Jews for the death of Jesus in fact try to pardon the pope himself for the sins of the Holocaust?

We think deep down that he thinks that it does, whether or not he realizes what he has written and its implications.