Steven Spielberg movie to examine notorious Catholic kidnapping of Jewish boy

Josephine McKenna
February 26, 2017
RELIGION NEWS SERVICE

“It is a symbol of the forced conversion that was done at the time,” Bologna's chief rabbi Alberto Sermoneta said. “The spiritual leaders of that era breached human rights and the laws of nature by removing that child from his family. When I was a child at Jewish school, we all studied the Mortara case. It is shocking.”



"The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara" painting by Moritz Daniel Oppenheim from 1862. (Image courtesy of Creative Commons.)

BOLOGNA, Italy - It was a heart-wrenching story that bitterly divided Catholics and Jews in Italy and provoked an international scandal more than 150 years ago.

Edgardo Mortara, a Jewish boy from Bologna, was secretly baptized by a maid when he fell ill and then forcibly removed from his family in 1858 at age 6 and raised as a Catholic with the blessing of Pope Pius IX.

Now Academy Award-winning director Steven Spielberg is making a film about the ill-fated battle by Mortara’s parents for the return of their son, who eventually became a priest. Oscar Isaac will play the adult Mortara and Mark Rylance has been cast as Pius; Tony Kushner wrote the screenplay.

Spielberg has been scouring the world for the right child actor to play the role of Mortara, and the film is certain to cast fresh light on this controversial real-life drama when it is released.

https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2017/02/26/steven-spielberg-movie-examine-notorious-catholic-kidnapping-jewish-boy/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortara_case