After 500 years, a new synagogue opens in Sicily
More than 500 years after the Jews were expelled from Sicily, a tiny Jewish community will open its first synagogue in the island’s capital city of Palermo.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Palermo transferred a chapel to the Jewish community. That chapel, the Oratory of Santa Maria al Sabato, was built above the ruins of the Great Synagogue which once stood in the center of Palermo.
The archbishop of Palermo, Corrado Lorefice, described the initiative as a “gesture of hope” designed to build dialogue between Catholics and Jews.
