Father Tom Baima: Jewish community’s friend, teacher, and ally

Following the end of World War II and the Shoah , the Catholic Church went to great lengths to correct its millennia’s worth of the teaching of contempt for Judaism and the Jewish people.

As His Eminence, the late Francis Cardinal George said, the wonderful Catholic-Jewish relationship is not dependent upon any one person in the Catholic Church because it is doctrinal. By which he meant, that affection and respect for the Jewish people is an axiomatic religious principle for the Catholic Church. Over these decades, the Chicago Jewish community has been exceedingly fortunate that the Archbishop of Chicago, Cardinal Bernardin, Cardinal George, and now Cardinal Cupich, have embodied this commitment.

During this time, over the past few decades, it has been the singular responsibility of one individual in the Archdiocese for the stewardship of this relationship-Father Thomas Baima. While Fr. Baima, who died on April 20, is not well known in the broad Catholic or Jewish communities, he has long endeared himself to Chicago’s Jewish community leadership.

His formal titles were Provost of St. Mary of the Lake Seminary in Mundelein, and Vicar for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the Archdiocese of Chicago. In these capacities, he managed the day-to-day relationship between Chicago’s Archdiocese and our Jewish community.

As a deeply faithful Catholic, he had profound respect for faithful and believing Jews. So, the study and understanding of Judaism was of paramount importance to him. He once said: “You know the difference between Judaism and Christianity? The sequence for a faithful Jew is: I belong, I do, I believe. For a Christian it is the opposite: I believe, I belong, I do.”

Many years ago, he and I were both inspired by the late Cardinal George, who, when he came to Chicago in 1997, was asked, “What concerns you most about the Catholic-Jewish relationship?” He replied, “I worry that it will not deepen.” Fr. Baima spent the next quarter century deepening that relationship in ways too many to enumerate.

He lived by a principle that applies to all human relations, but especially to the Catholic-Jewish relationship. In the 1974 Notes to Nostra Aetate , the Church called for Catholic faithful to understand Judaism and the Jewish people as they understand themselves.

Fr. Baima regularly practiced that. He would regularly inquire about our understanding of this or that verse in the Torah, or this or that passage in Rabbinic literature. Indeed, he was so trusted a friend and colleague that when the Jewish community had to develop documents to present to a variety of Christian denominations, we could always count on sharing the drafts with him, and on receiving his best advice. He never failed us. To be sure, both the Archdiocese and the Jewish United Fund, given their responsibilities, would occasionally face common difficult problems or disagreements. Fr. Baima was a man with whom one could resolve conflict or disagreement with goodness and wisdom. He always did so with vast knowledge of the Catholic Church, good humor, deep warmth, and, most significantly, with impeccable integrity. No matter how difficult the question put to him, Fr. Baima would always answer with knowledge, wisdom, and honesty.

In April, the Jewish community lost a friend, a teacher, and an ally. May his memory be a blessing in the Jewish tradition means that the deceased’s life continues to instruct, teach, and inspire beyond the years of their life. Fr. Thomas Baima’s memory will surely be a continuing blessing.

Rabbi Yehiel E. Poupko is the Rabbinic Scholar of the Jewish United Fund of Chicago.