Rebel Catholics say Vatican caved on Latin prayer | World | Reuters

Rebel Catholics say Vatican caved on Latin prayer | World | Reuters

By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

PARIS (Reuters) - Rebel Catholic traditionalists who champion the old Latin mass have accused Pope Benedict of caving in to "foreign pressures" by dropping negative comments about Jews from a rare prayer in the Church's official language.

The Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), which was expelled from the Church in 1988, denounced the change in a Good Friday prayer that it said was one of the oldest in Christianity, dating back to the third century.

On Feb. 5, the Vatican revised the prayer, removing a reference to Jewish "blindness" over Christ and deleting a phrase asking God to "remove the veil from their hearts".

Jews criticised the new text because it still says they should recognise Jesus Christ as the saviour of all mankind. It asks that "all Israel may be saved" and keeps an underlying call to conversion that Jewish leaders had wanted omitted.