BALTIMORE — As another in a series of recent Roman Catholic overtures toward the Jewish community, Baltimore's Cardinal William H. Keeler last week presented a papal honor to a New York rabbi long active in Catholic-Jewish relations.

In an afternoon ceremony at St. Mary's Seminary and University in Baltimore, Rabbi Mordecai Waxman of Great Neck, N.Y., became the fifth Jew, and the first rabbi ever, named a Knight Commander of Saint Gregory the Great.

Pope John Paul II bestowed the award on Waxman "in recognition of his extraordinary leadership over the past several decades in fostering improved relations between the Jewish people and the Catholic Church," Keeler said.

Waxman, 81, is chairman of the National Council of Synagogues and a past chairman of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations, where he did much of his work toward healing Catholic-Jewish relations, according to Keeler.

In 1987, when Waxman was president of the Synagogue Council of America, the predecessor to the National Council, he and then-Bishop Keeler began a tradition of regular meetings between rabbis and Catholic bishops that continues today, Keeler said.

Waxman helped prepare the pope's visits with American Jewish leaders in 1987, and he addressed the pontiff on behalf of the Jewish community in Miami that year.

"Over the years, Rabbi Waxman has been a consistent peacemaker and worked for reconciliation between the Jewish people and the Catholic Church," Keeler said.

Waxman praised the pontiff for his interest in Catholic-Jewish enterprises, including the Vatican's recent statement of repentance for the Holocaust.

"That he has undertaken to honor Jews for such activities and has bestowed such recognition upon several of my co-religionists for their notable contributions is typical of the innovative thinking which he has brought to world affairs," Waxman told an audience of more than 100, including scores of his congregants who traveled from Temple Israel, where the rabbi has presided for 50 years.

The Order of St. Gregory the Great was created by Pope Gregory XVI in 1831 in honor of his predecessor, Pope St. Gregory. It has several classes, the highest being the Grand Cross.

Previous Jewish recipients include Sir Sigmund Sternberg of London, a recent Templeton Prize winner; the late Joseph Lichten, who was European director of the Anti-Defamation League; Gerhardt Riegner, a former general secretary of the World Jewish Congress; and, most recently, conductor Gilbert Levine, one of Waxman's congregants.

For his part, the rabbi acknowledged and tried to assuage the continuing suspicion many Jews hold toward the Catholic Church, despite 30 years of papal teachings against anti-Semitism.

But he said future generations will see the fruits of the current efforts. "That perhaps is what the Talmud means when it says, `There are things that take fruit of which a man enjoys in this world…but the capital endures for all time. And among these is the effectings of peace between man and his fellows.'"