"Nostra Aetate at 40: Seeds for a Secure Future" is the theme of an evening event Sept. 22 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels that commemorates the 40th anniversary of Nostra Aetate, the Second Vatican Council's Declaration on the relation of the church to non-Christian religions.

Cardinal William Keeler of Baltimore and Rabbi Michael A. Singer of the University of Notre Dame will be the featured speakers at the event, presented by the archdiocesan Office of Interreligious and Ecumenical Affairs, the Board of Rabbis of Southern California and the American Jewish Committee.

"This event offers an opportunity for all people to learn more about the significance of Nostra Aetate, highlighting areas in which it has presented us challenges, and areas in which we have been quite successful in furthering interreligious relationships and dialogue," said Father Alexei Smith, archdiocesan Interreligious and Ecumenical officer.

Cardinal Keeler is a member of the Vatican's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, and the episcopal moderator for Catholic-Jewish Relations at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Rabbi Singer, a former professor at St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, is a professor of theology at Notre Dame and director of the Notre Dame Holocaust Project.

Promulgated Oct. 28, 1965, Nostra Aetate remains "an unprecedented document" in the history of the Catholic Church, said Father Smith. "There had been nothing like it in the history of the church, a document in which the Catholic Church acknowledged that truth does exist in non-Christian faiths," he said.

Moreover, Father Smith cited as "tremendously important" the document's assertion that "neither all Jews indiscriminately at that time, nor Jews today, can be charged with the crimes committed during [Christ's] passion (n. 4)."

This declaration and acknowledgement has led to many manifestations of growing harmony between the Catholic and Jewish community in Los Angeles," Father Smith said, citing the annual Catholic-Jewish women's dialogue, the teaching of Jewish history in Catholic high schools, the Bearing Witness program in which Catholic school teachers travel to historic sites to visit the roots of anti-Semitism, and the donation of a fountain at the Cathedral by a Jewish couple.

"All of this would have been unheard of 40 years ago," Father Smith said. "And we know we have much work to do; we have to enflesh this wonderful document in the hearts and minds of all of our Catholic people. This event at the Cathedral we hope will not only celebrate but build upon the positive steps we have made."

"Nostra Aetate at 40" will take place 7:30-9 p.m. on Sept. 22 at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, 555 W. Temple St., Los Angeles. Admission is free; parking is $5. For more information, call (213) 637-7556.

To view the document Nostra Aetate in its entirety, visit www.vatican.va/archive, and follow the link to Vatican II.