ACT NOW: Urge Pope Benedict XVI to Reinstate the Excommunication of Holocaust-Denying Bishop

January 25, 2009

ACT NOW:
Urge Pope Benedict XVI to Reinstate the Excommunication of Holocaust-Denying Bishop

	"The historical evidence is hugely against 6 million Jews having been deliberately gassed in gas chambers as a deliberate policy of Adolf Hitler. I believe there were no gas chambers..."                     —Bishop Richard Williamson   Sign Protest to Pope Benedict XVI Watch video of Rabbi Hier speaking about this issue...

As the world joins together tomorrow to commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Pope Benedict XVI has welcomed a Catholic Bishop and denier of the Nazi Holocaust back into the Church.

Britain's Bishop Richard Williamson, who is reportedly being investigated for Holocaust denial in Germany, denied the murder of 6 million Jews by stating in an interview on Swedish state television last week, "I think that 200,000 to 300,000 Jews died in Nazi concentration camps, but none of them in gas chambers."

We need you to act now. First, Join the Center's protest urging Pope Benedict XVI's to reinstate the excommunication he lifted of Holocaust-denying Bishop Williamson. After making your voice of protest heard by signing the petition, click the link to watch the Bishop's television interview.

Second, please make a generous contribution to the Simon Wiesenthal Center to help us continue in the worldwide fight against anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial.

The Pope must make clear to the world that at a time when anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial have reached the highest levels in two decades and protesters at anti-Israel rallies are chanting, "Jews back to the ovens", his decision to welcome a Holocaust denier back into the Church will only validate Holocaust denial and contradicts the teachings of Vatican II. Bishops who preach anti-Semitism or Holocaust denial should not be embraced by the Vatican.

Bishop Williamson is one of four Catholic Bishops belonging to the notoriously anti-Semitic 'Society of Saint Pius', a breakaway group which opposes changes in Catholic doctrine. According to news reports, Williamson has endorsed "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion", a notorious anti-Semitic forgery, and claimed that Jews are bent on world domination.

Just last week, Pope Benedict XVI lifted the excommunication of Williamson and three other Bishops belonging to this group.

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