Events

David Kertzer on The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara: The Continuing Controversy

Date: Monday, October 12, 2020
Time: 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Online OnlyOnline Only

David Kertzer on The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara: The Continuing Controversy
Seldom does the gripping drama of a single family resound throughout the world and change the course of history. Recent events, though, show it does happen. The forcible taking of the six-year-old Italian Jewish boy Edgardo Mortara from his distraught parents by the police at the direction of the Papal Inquisitor of Bologna, in June, 1858, ultimately to be raised as a Christian priest, set off an immediate firestorm of protest around the world. The firestorm, that included the French Emperor and the governments of Britain, Spain, and the Netherlands, the international press, and mobilized for the first time an international Jewish political response, undermined the legitimacy of the Pope’s secular rule of the Papal States, leading to their demise and the Unification of the Italian State.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Kertzer tells this dramatic tale, with all its narrative layers, in The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara. Published in 1997, it has been translated into 18 languages and, incredibly, 23 years later is still the subject of intense controversy within the Catholic Church. Dr. Kertzer will explain how such an unlikely story came about, and why it still speaks to us today. He will be interviewed by George E. Johnson, senior editor of Moment Magazine and a member of the board of directors of the Haberman Institute.

Registrants for this free webinar will be invited to pose questions to Dr. Kertzer, and are encouraged to read in advance either Dr. Kertzer’s 1997 book or one of several articles available online relating to the Mortara story including:

The Enduring Controversy Over the Montara Case
The Doctored ‘Memoir’ of a Jewish Boy Kidnapped by the Vatican

This online program is free and open to the public. Registrants will receive the Zoom link prior to the event. 

Cost: Free

Register: Visit Website

For questions or to request accommodations contact:

Rebecca Leavey
[email protected]

Location

Zoom Webinar