From Vatican II to Today: The Ongoing Challenge of Dialogue. Report from the Conference “Nostra Aetate in Their Age and in Ours”

Source: Christosemitism ERC Project

It is not often that a conference on a sixty-year-old conciliar document feels as urgent as breaking news.

Yet I felt that “Nostra Aetate in Their Age and in Ours” (November 18–20, 2025), held between Notre Dame Jerusalem (Tantur) and the Mount Scopus campus of the Hebrew University, did precisely that: it brought the theological revolution of Vatican II into direct confrontation with the wounds and dilemmas of the present moment. The conference was sponsored by the Christosemitism ERC Project, the University of Notre Dame, the Cardinal Bea Centre for Judaic Studies at the Pontifical Gregorian University and The Center for the Study of Christianity at the Hebrew University ofJerusalem.

Promulgated in 1965, Nostra Aetate was the Second Vatican Council’s declaration on the Church’s relationship to non-Christian religions, marking a decisive turn— especially in its rejection of antisemitism and its affirmation of the enduring bond between the Catholic Church and the Jewish people. Sixty years later, the conference organizers asked a pressing question: what remains of that breakthrough in a world marked by renewed violence, political polarization, and deepening mistrust?

Gathering academics, clergy, and interfaith practitioners, the conference unfolded in the shadow of the ongoing Israel– Gaza war; an unsettling context that sharpened every intervention. In the opening session, alongside Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Bishop Rafic Nahra and Zvi Novick (University of Notre Dame) helped frame the conference by situating its questions within the broader intellectual and institutional landscape of contemporary Jewish–Christian studies. Cardinal Pizzaballa highlighted the historical breakthrough of Nostra Aetate for Catholic–Jewish relations, while acknowledging the difficulties of its reception, especially in more traditionalist milieux. In light of the events of October 7 and the following war, he called for the courage to “open a new page” in dialogue. Bishop Nahra echoed this appeal, stressing that dialogue in wartime is both more fragile and more necessary. He recalled that Nostra Aetate itself emerged in a tense political climate and reaffirmed the Church’s enduring spiritual bond with the Jewish people alongside its unequivocalrejection of antisemitism.

The conference program, which included 20 presentations by international and local scholars, mapped the many lives of Nostra Aetate across disciplines and contexts. Early panels revisited its contested origins and theological implications. Karma Ben-Johanan situated Jewish–Christian relations within shifting political and cultural frameworks, pointing to the crisis of liberalism and the emotional strain of post–October 7 realities. Nina Valbousquet introduced new archival insights into the Vatican’s engagement with antisemitism, while Gavin D’Costa offered a deliberately provocative reading of the declaration’s legacy. His proposal of a “minimalist Catholic Zionism”—grounded in covenantal theology, the overcoming of hard supersessionism, and the affirmation of an enduring bond with Israel—raised pressing theological and moral questions in light of current conflicts. Matthew Tapie engaged the question of Zionism from the perspective of Catholic Social Teaching

#######################

.

#############################

The conference concluded with a keynote lecture by Massimo Faggioli (Trinity College Dublin), who offered a sobering and globally attentive reassessment of Nostra Aetate. He argued that the document was deeply embedded in a Western narrative—both in what it articulated and in what it left unsaid. Emerging from a predominantly European and North American context, it focused above all on Jewish–Christian relations, reflecting the centrality of that encounter in the postwar West. Today, however, this framework is increasingly challenged by the rise of postcolonial and decolonial perspectives, which often view documents rooted in Western intellectual and theological traditions with suspicion, if not outright rejection. At the same time, the global context of interreligious relations has shifted: the optimism of postconciliar dialogue has given way, in many regions, to encounters marked by tension and conflict. As the demographic center of the Catholic Church moves toward Africa and Asia, Catholics now live primarily alongside Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists, while Judaism is often absent or present in very different forms. In this light, Faggioli suggested that Nostra Aetate resembles a “short blanket”—a text that cannot fully cover the complexity of contemporary realities.

If the conference traced the fragility of that promise, it also gestured toward its quiet resilience. Selected papers from the conference will be published in an edited volume, ensuring that the conversations initiated in Jerusalem continue to shape scholarly and theological reflection in the years to come. In her closing remarks, HUJI Dean of Humanities Elisheva Baumgarten reflected on the tension between ideology and lived reality: at times, theology has been hostile while everyday relations remained humane; at other times, the reverse has been true. It is in these daily encounters, she suggested, that hope persists. Recalling her early morning runs through Jerusalem—where Jews, Christians, and Muslims cross paths in ordinary, unguarded ways—she offered a modest but powerful image: even in a city marked by trauma and violence, shared life continues.

Perhaps it is precisely there, in these minimal and often unarticulated encounters, that the legacy of Nostra Aetate may find the resources forits ongoing development.

Katarzyna Czerwonogóra

Nostra Aetate in Their Age and in Ours

This video captures the first day of the international conference "Nostra Aetate in Their Age and in Ours," hosted by the Franco Family Institute for Liberal Arts and the Public Good at the University of Notre Dame.

Held at Notre Dame Jerusalem (Tantur), the first day of the conference explores the historical impact and contemporary relevance of the landmark Vatican II document Nostra Aetate, which fundamentally transformed the Catholic Church's relationship with non-Christian religions, particularly Judaism.

Opening Remarks & Welcome

Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa
Bishop Rafic Nahra
Tzvi Novick
Daniel Schwake

Panel 1: Nostra Aetate's Early and Current Challenges

Chair: Tzvi Novick, University of Notre Dame

Speakers:

• Karma Ben-Johanan, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• Gavin D’Costa, Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas
• Nina Valbousquet, CNRS

Nostra Aetate in Their Age and in Ours WhatsApp Image 2025-12-23 at 18.14.19.jpeg Opening Remarks & Welcome

Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa

Bishop Rafic Nahra

Tzvi Novick

Daniel Schwake

WhatsApp Image 2025-12-23 at 18.20.53.jpeg Panel 1: Nostra Aetate's Early and Current Challenges

Chair: Tzvi Novick, University of Notre Dam

​Speakers:

• Karma Ben-Johanan, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• Gavin D’Costa, Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas
• Nina Valbousquet, CNRS

WhatsApp Image 2025-12-24 at 09.41.28.jpeg Panel 2: Nostra Aetate and Middle Eastern Politics

Chair: Hana Bendcowsky, Rossing Center for Education and Dialogue

​Speakers:

• Amir Krispel, Hebrew University
• Maayan Raveh, University of Haifa
• Matthew Tapie, Saint Leo University