Still rolling at express-train pace, the third session of the Vatican Council last week debated an issue that for many remains the supreme test of Roman Catholicism's good will toward other faiths and the modern world. Under discussion was the proposed declaration on antiSemitism, and the coffee bars inside St. Peter's were deserted as the 2,500 bishops huddled silently in the aula, listening while speaker after speaker denounced the text as inadequate, meaningless and unjust.
The criticism could have been avoided. Last fall, Augustin Cardinal Bea, venerable head of the Vatican's Secretariat...
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