Nostra Aetate 60th Anniversary Lecture

Join us for the anniversary lecture Accomplishments and Challenges in Jewish-Christian Relations 60 Years after Nostra Aetate, on 25th November 2025, at the Woolf Institute, at 5:15pm.

This event is hybrid. If you are planning on attending virtually, then please select the online ticket option when you register.

Delivered by Professor Phil Cunningham, a leading thinker in Catholic-Jewish relations and Dr Ed Kessler, a prominent scholar in Jewish-Christian-Muslim relations, this lecture promises to provide some fascinating interfaith discussions to mark the 60th Anniversary of Nostra Aetate, regarded as the most influential of the modern church documents on Jewish-Christian relations.

The anniversary lecture is jointly organised by the Woolf Institute and the Von Hugel Institute. It will take place in the K C Shasha Suite at the Woolf Institute.

Nostra Aetate, ('In Our Time'), was proclaimed on 28 October, 1965 by Pope John VI and consists of the 4 and most important section of Vatican II's Declaration on non-Christian religions. It is regarded as the most influential of the modern church documents on Jewish-Christian relations, achieving a radical reversal of the Church's 'teaching of contempt' against Jews and Judaism and marking the beginnings of a fresh approach by the Roman Catholic Church.

Dr Philip A. Cunningham is Professor of Theology and director of the Institute for Jewish-Catholic Relations of Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, PA. He specialises in theologies of the Christian and Jewish, and especially the Catholic-Jewish, relationship. He is the author or editor of over a dozen books, most recently Maxims for Mutuality: Principles for Catholic Theology, Education, and Preaching about Jews and Judaism (2022, Paulist Press Stimulus Series). Dr Cunningham has served as president and honorary president of the International Council of Christians and Jews and on the Advisory Committee on Catholic-Jewish Relations for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.