Language:
English
Year of publication:
2007
Titel der Quelle:
Holocaust and Genocide Studies
Angaben zur Quelle:
21,3 (2007) 378-403
Keywords:
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Influence
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) Catholic Church
;
Jewish children in the Holocaust
;
Holocaust survivors
Abstract:
After the war, three Jewish leaders met with top Vatican officials in attempts to convince the Church to help find and return to Judaism children who had been rescued by Catholic families or institutions. In 1945-46, World Jewish Congress leaders Leon Kubowitzki (later Aryeh Leon Kubovy) and Gerhart Riegner, as well as Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Palestine Isaac Herzog, met with Pope Pius XII and with papal aide Montini (later Pope Paul VI). The results of these efforts were mixed; the Jewish leaders were disappointed at the vagueness of the Vatican's reaction. Concludes that the somewhat positive Vatican response, despite its limitations, was a stage in the transition between unsatisfactory Catholic-Jewish encounters during World War II and the sea-change of Vatican II. There was some goodwill, but also continued misunderstanding and some continuation of tragic gaps. Both sides lacked specific information about the children in question, and neither Riegner nor Herzog mentioned the Vatican's theological problem with children who had been baptized. Many Jewish children were freely turned over to Jewish instititions and there was no campaign by the Vatican to "kidnap" Jewish children after the war, but there was also no clear call to respond to the suffering of the Jewish people.
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