WASHINGTON (AFP)---Pope Benedict XVI on Thursday urged Jews and Roman Catholics to forge "new attitudes" to foster world peace, in a Passover greeting delivered after a row between the two faiths.
At a private meeting between the pope and Jewish leaders in Washington, where Benedict began his first papal visit to the United States on Tuesday, the pontiff said relations between the two faiths had changed for the better.
"I wish ... to reiterate the Church's commitment to the dialogue that in the past 40 years has fundamentally changed our relationship for the better,"
the pope said in a written message he read to Jewish leaders.
"I ask the Jewish community to accept my Passover greeting in a spirit of openness to the real possibilities of cooperation," the pope said in his message delivered before Passover starts on Saturday.
"Our shared hope for peace in the world embraces the Middle East and the Holy Land in particular.
"May the memories of God's mercies which Jews and Christians celebrate at this time, inspire all those responsible for that region ... to new efforts and especially to new attitudes and a new purification of hearts," he said.
The Vatican had added the meeting with Jewish leaders in Washington and a ground-breaking papal visit to a synagogue in New York to the pontiff's already busy itinerary just a week before he left Rome.
Although the official line from Rome was that the meetings were added as a gesture of good will on the eve of Passover, US-based Vatican observers said the last-minute additions were also an exercise in "damage control" by the pontiff.
"There was a lot of alarm in the Jewish community when Benedict was elected three years ago, because they felt John Paul II had been a great friend and they weren't sure where this new guy was going to go," veteran Vatican-watcher John Allen told AFP.
"There have been some good moments, but there have also been some rocky moments, including most recently the controversy over the Good Friday prayer."
Benedict has continued the conciliatory steps taken by his predecessor, Polish-born John Paul II, to improve inter-faith relations, but he has sometimes stumbled.
Latin prayer controversy
Jewish leaders last month slammed the pope for his refusal to abolish a prayer in the Latin mass on Good Friday -- the day that commemorates the death of Jesus Christ -- in which Catholics pray for the conversion of Jews.
The "Prayer for Jews" was dropped in the 1960s, but reappeared last year after Benedict restored the Latin Rite mass, including the controversial prayer.
The prayer was toned down to try to allay Jewish fears, but it retains the call for Jews to be converted.
Cardinal Walter Kasper, who coordinates Catholic dialogue with the Jews, said the prayer does not encourage proselytizing and respects the Jewish faith.
In early April the Holy See said it wished to give an assurance that the new formulation of the prayer "in no way intends to indicate a change in the Catholic Church's regard for the Jews."
It stressed the "unique bond with which the people of the New Testament is spiritually linked with the stock of Abraham and rejects every attitude of contempt or discrimination against Jews, firmly repudiating any kind of anti-Semitism."