VATICAN CITY (RNS) Underscoring the close ties between Christianity and Judaism and calling Holocaust denial “madness,” Pope Francis told an interviewer that “inside every Christian is a Jew.”

In a wide-ranging interview published Friday (June 13) in Spain’s La Vanguardia newspaper, the pope said dialogue between the two faiths can sometimes be a “hot potato.”

“I believe that interreligious dialogue must investigate the Jewish roots of Christianity and the Christian flowering of Judaism,” Francis said. “I understand it is a challenge, a hot potato, but it is possible to live as brothers.”

Francis’ statement seems to go further than his predecessor, St. John Paul II, who made headlines in 1986 as the first pope to visit Rome’s main synagogue and declared Jews to be the “elder brothers” of the Christian faith.

“Every day, I pray with the Psalms of David. My prayer is Jewish, then I have the Eucharist, which is Christian,” the Argentine pontiff added.

The pope also took the opportunity to criticize Holocaust denial as “madness” while defending the record of Pope Pius XII, who led the Roman Catholic Church during World War II.

Francis will soon have to decide whether to advance the sainthood cause for the controversial wartime pope, who is accused of failing to speak out publicly against the m*** murder of Jews. For years, Jewish leaders and Nazi hunters have demanded the Vatican open up its secret wartime files.

Francis said he was concerned about “everything which has been thrown at poor Pius XII,” while stressing that he sheltered Jews in the convents of Rome and other Italian cities, as well as the popes’ summer residence in Castel Gadolfo.
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