Pope Benedict XVI and Judaism - Tridentine Mass

Tridentine Mass

In 2007, Benedict issued the Summorum Pontificum which is widely seen as an attempt to heal the rift with the SSPX. The decree allowed for wider use of the Tridentine Mass which includes a Good Friday prayer:

Let us pray also for the Jews: that almighty God may remove the veil from their hearts; so that they too may acknowledge Jesus Christ our Lord. Let us pray. Let us kneel. Arise. Almighty and eternal God, who dost also not exclude from thy mercy the Jews: hear our prayers, which we offer for the blindness of that people; that acknowledging the light of thy Truth, which is Christ, they may be delivered from their darkness. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Anti-Defamation league described Benedict's decision as 'body blow to Catholic-Jewish relations'. Some Jewish leaders "feared revival of the prayer would undo four decades of progress following Nostra Aetate, the 1965 document that absolved the Jews of the killing of Jesus and marked a new period of Jewish-Catholic relations."

In response to these concerns, Pope Benedict revised the prayer and eliminated all references to the "blindness" and "darkness" of the Jews. Rabbi David Rosen, chairman of the International Jewish Committee for Interreligious Consultations, told the Jerusalem Post that the removal of references to the “darkness” and the “blindness” of the Jews for refusing to recognize Jesus as the messiah was a sign Pope Benedict was "deeply committed to advancing the relationship with the Jewish Community." http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope_benedict_to_reformulate_good_friday_prayers_for_tridentine_mass/