L'église de France et les enfants juifs

Description

Focuses on a note, found recently by Poujol, which was sent from the office of the Apostolic Nuncio in Paris to Cardinal Gerlier in October 1946, ordering that Jewish children who had been rescued by Catholic organizations during the Holocaust and then baptized should not be returned to the Jews, not even to their parents. Discusses to what degree the note was in fact observed, mainly by Gerlier, who had been instrumental in rescuing Jewish children in Lyon, and by Bishop Caillot of Grenoble. Examines, also, how the order was implemented in the Finaly Affair. Pt. 1 (p. 25-87), "Le rôle de l'Église de France dans le rapatriement des enfants juifs déportés en Allemagne (1944-1947)", discusses the efforts of two Jewish organizations, the Vaad ha-Hatzalah Agoudat ha-Rabanim (in Paris) and the Rescue Children Organization (in New York), to retrieve Jewish children who had survived Nazi camps. Papal missions, on the other hand, sought to return the children to Catholic homes in France. Jewish requests to Pope Pius XII to return these children to their families or to Jewish insitutions were rejected for some of the children. However, denounces the idea that this was the concerted stance of the Catholic Church.

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