Robert Sungenis - Views On Jews and Judaism

Views On Jews and Judaism

Sungenis has become known for controversial views of the Jewish people and Judaism that have been sharply criticized by some of his fellow Catholics and by the Southern Poverty Law Center as being anti-semitic. In 2002 he questioned the Holocaust, and according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, "repeated a series of ancient anti-Semitic canards" and later wrote about the involvement of Jews and Israel in a New World Order Satanic conspiracy aimed at world domination.

Sungenis has responded that he is against Zionism, but that he is not anti-semitic. "Anti-semitism is a hatred for the Jewish race. There isn't a bone in my body that feels that way about Jewish people," he wrote. In 2008, Sungenis' bishop, Kevin C. Rhoades, denounced his views of the Jewish people and Judaism as "hostile, uncharitable, and un-Christian" and required Sungenis to stop writing about them. He also directed him to stop using the word "Catholic" in his organization's name. Sungenis has stated that he will only comply with Bishop Rhoades' directive to stop writing about Jews and Judaism if he is forced to do so "under the aegis of a canonical trial".