The link below is to a 1996 statement by the United Methodist Church on the relationship between Christianity and Judaism.
Building New Bridges in Hope (1996)
The statement acknowledges the role of Christians in the development and promotion of anti-Jewish ideas and attitudes that “culminated” in the Holocaust.
As followers of Jesus Christ we deeply repent of the complicity of the Church and the participation of many Christians in the long history of persecution of the Jewish people. The Christian Church has a profound obligation to correct historical and theological teachings that have led to false and pejorative perceptions of Judaism and contributed to persecution and hatred of Jews.
Especially crucial for Christians in our quest for understanding has been the struggle to recognize the horror of the Holocaust as the catastrophic culmination of a long history of anti-Jewish attitudes and actions in which Christians, and sometimes the Church itself, have been deeply implicated.
The statement affirms the irrevocable nature of the covenants that God established with Israel— the Jewish people continue to be in covenant with God today.
We believe that just as God is steadfastly faithful to the biblical covenant in Jesus Christ, likewise God is steadfastly faithful to the biblical covenant with the Jewish people. The covenant God established with the Jewish people through Abraham, Moses and others continues because it is an eternal covenant. Paul proclaims that the gift and call of God to the Jews is irrevocable (Romans 11:29). Thus we believe that the Jewish people continue in covenantal relationship with God.
