Is the Pope Catholic? are Jews Jews?

Great good sense, from Saul Singer, in the Jerusalem Post, and a fascinating lookat the changing attitudes of Judaism to proselytizing, as well as a warning to the Church and the "oh, what does it matter as long as you're a nice person?" advocates among Her members .
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1206621744170&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Go read the whole piece.

On Easter this week, controversy has swirled around Pope Benedict XVI, both for personally baptizing a prominent Muslim Italian journalist and for allowing the revived Latin mass to hope that Jews convert.
Aside from Osama bin Laden's ravings about a "new Crusade," Muslims have attacked the Pope for his "provocative" act. Similarly, regarding the Latin mass, German Jewish leader Charlotte Knobloch said "I would have assumed that this German pope, of all people, had got to know first-hand the ostracizing of Jewry. ... I could not have imagined that [he] could now impose such phrases upon his Church." ...
I still understand the Pope more than I do his critics. The Pope wants Muslims and Jews to become Christians. Should this be a surprise? If the Pope won't advocate Christianity, who will?To be Christian, Muslim or Jewish should mean believing that one's faith and creed is superior to others. Otherwise, being an adherent is not really a matter of belief, but of inertia - a statement that other faiths might be better but it is not worth the effort to explore or switch. ...
Of the three Abrahamic religions, Christianity is currently the closest to striking the right "outreach" balance. Muslims have been threatened with death for converting, and a prominent strain of Islam is attempting to spread itself by force, including terrorism.
Judaism has gone to the other extreme. ...
This was not always so, far from it. The book of Matthew records a Christian accusation that Jews will "travel over sea and land to make a single convert." Even during centuries of persecution and exile, when conversion could mean a death sentence, Jews continued to seek and welcome converts. When rabbinic opinion began to turn against seeking converts, it was mainly on the grounds of the dangers of doing so, not a rejection of the welcoming Jewish ideal. ...
The great sociologist Peter Berger, who though not Jewish wrote a 1979 article in Commentary endorsing Reform leader Alexander Schindler's call to reach out to the "unchurched," goes even further. ... "you will not be able to keep your own unless you are prepared to persuade others." ... The fact that Jews have lost the desire to welcome newcomers is the most telling evidence that we have lost our sense of purpose as a people. When we rediscover our purpose of affecting the world directly and by example - as individuals, families, and as a people - we will start attracting ourselves and others. (Emphasis mine)