Vigilance and resolution:
Living antidotes to an ancient virus
THE MOST REVEREND AND RIGHT HONOURABLE
JUSTIN WELBY, ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY
The Most Reverend Justin Welby is the 105th
Archbishop of Canterbury. Before his ordination
he worked in the oil industry for eleven years.
After serving as a parish priest he ran the
international reconciliation ministry at Coventry
Cathedral, later becoming Dean of Liverpool
Cathedral and then Bishop of Durham.
Antisemitism is an insidious evil.
The habits of antisemitism have
been burrowing into European and
British culture for as long as we
can remember. In England, during
the late mediaeval period, the
Jewish community faced constant
persecution: Shylock, the great
villain of the Merchant of Venice,
was a cliché of his time. By the time
Cromwell reopened England to Jewish
settlement under the Commonwealth
in the 1650s, antisemitism had
mutated within common parlance
and culture.
It is a shameful truth that, through
its theological teachings, the church,
which should have offered an antidote,
compounded the spread of this virus.
The fact that antisemitism has infected
the body of the Church is something
of which we as Christians must be
deeply repentant. We live with the
consequences of our history of denial
and complicity.
Even today, in the 21st century, it is
shocking that antisemitism still has
traction; the virus continues to seek
a host. It latches onto a variety of
different issues: financial inequality,
wars and depressions, education,
politics and government, grave
international issues, such as the
rights of Israelis and Palestinians, and
interfaith tensions. It twists them to
its own ends, with the perverted and
absurd argument that a small group
runs or plots against our society and
manipulates international affairs.
Antisemitism is at the heart of
racism. Yet, because it is so deeply
entrenched in our thought and culture,
it is often ignored and dismissed. This
tendency must be vigorously resisted;
antisemitism needs to be confronted
in every part of our communal life and
cultural imagination.
Alongside a robust condemnation of
antisemitic discourse, it is imperative
that we celebrate the extraordinary
contribution of the Jewish community
to British society over the centuries:
10 – Lessons Learned? Reflections on antisemitism and the Holocaust
Lessons Learned.indd 10
21/09/2016 16:23