Priest's beatification stalled amid anti-Semitism claim

Pope Benedict XVI has suspended the planned beatification of a French priest while the Vatican investigates allegations of anti-Semitism in his writings.

The case of the Rev Leon Dehon, who founded the priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus religious order in 1877, is even more remarkable because he probably would have been beatified had Pope John Paul II lived a few weeks longer.

The ceremony to beatify Dehon, the last step before possible sainthood, was scheduled for April 24. John Paul died on April 2 and Benedict was installed as Pope on April 24, forcing the beatification ceremony to be put off.

But rather than rescheduling the ceremony for Dehon, Benedict decided to form a commission to study his case, effectively putting it on hold, after French bishops complained about anti-Semitism in his writings, church officials said.

The French Catholic newspaper La Croix said Dehon had written that the Jewish holy book, the Talmud, was the “manual of the bandit, corruptor, social destroyer”. It quoted him as writing that anti-Semitism was a “sign of hope”.