From the Pope down, the Catholic Church’s leadership failure over October 7

Vic Alhadeff meets Teresa Pirola, one of the few voices in the Australian Catholic church who has spoken out against her colleagues' silence.

Teresa Pirola has a clear picture in her mind as to what should have happened on October 8, 2023.

“October 7 occurred during a global synod of bishops convened by the Pope at the Vatican,” she says. “The Catholic world was watching. Given the severity of what had happened, the Holocaust and antisemitism, and the Catholic Church’s connection with that history, this was the Church’s moment to step up and enact its promise of ‘Never again’.

“What was needed was for Pope Francis to interrupt the synod and issue a statement condemning the Hamas massacre in the strongest possible terms and acknowledging the traumatic memory of Nazi pogroms.

“Then he could have made the 10-minute journey to Rome’s Great Synagogue and expressed his condolences to the Chief Rabbi, standing shoulder-to-shoulder before the cameras. It would have beamed around the world like the iconic photograph of Pope John Paul II at the Western Wall in 2000 and it would have given the lead to Catholic bishops to do the same. It would have modelled the synod’s theme, which was all about ‘walking together’. 

“But he didn’t do that. He missed that critical moment to use his words and papal body language to make a powerful statement against antisemitism and its most horrific manifestation since the Holocaust. It could have been a history-making moment, dramatically confronting the Catholic faithful with their post-Holocaust commitment and duty of care owed to the Jewish people. That failure in leadership has affected everything since.

“I have always been a great supporter of Pope Francis’ pastoral approach,” adds Pirola. “But in the Israel-Hamas conflict the Catholic response has missed the mark badly, at terrible cost to the Jewish people and to the Church’s moral credibility.”