Look

Saint Peter has a 'Jew-Fro'. That's because he is Jewish. The statue in front of Saint Peters is also a huge Jewish Peter with a "Jew-Fro". My Jewish friend thought all the saints were 'Catholic'- yes, but also most of the earlier ones were Jewish also. "Catholic" just means "Universal" as in the "Universal Church" . All the first apostles were Jewish - Jesus is Jewish. So is Mary his mother- the "Madonna." So is Mary Magdalene. Jewish. Went to the main Temple in Jerusalem for feast days like Passover. Worshipped in the synagogue around the Galilee in Northern Israel, a lot of them. For any of the catholic readers of this, you will think this piece annoyingly simplistic and may find yourself uttering "Duh." But no, I want you to think harder. Jewish. Jewish. We worship a Jewish person whom we attribute as having Divinity and in his Jewishness human, born of a Jewish mother in Israel of the covenant. Every Jewish person you see today is his brother or sister. The entire Vatican City is founded on the bones of a Jewish Martyr. It is the North Star of the New Jerusalem pointing us there. Every Pope since has been a successor apostolically to Peter the Jewish Martyr, and is his spiritual progeny. Jesus said of the 'goy' or gentiles that they are grafted into the vine in his vineyard and he is the Vine, we are all the branches who believe in him by our Faith in his redeeming power. Pope John Paul II called the Jews "our elder brothers" and deeply revered the Rabbi of Rome with whom he met. Pope John Paul II knew who the Vine Was.