Donnerstag, 25. September 2025, 18:30 - 20:00

Jüdisches Institut für Erwachsenenbildung, Praterstern 1, 1020 Wien

This lecture will discuss the aspects of agency on the part of male and female Catholic religious to hide or not to hide Jews in their convents and institutions. It will examine the different types of communities, how religious carried out the rescue inside their institutions, the internal and external dangers they confronted, and their networking operations with Jewish and non-Jewish rescue groups, and individuals. It will also relate to the daily life of Jews hiding in these institutions. The lecture will conclude by primarily discussing the hidden Jewish children and what do we know happened to them in the immediate postwar period and the traditional practices of many of the religious communities regarding custody.

Eliot Nidam Orvieto is Head of the Academic Affairs Section at Yad Vashems International Institute for Holocaust Research and is responsible for Yad Vashems project on the Vatican and the Church. His expertise is on Roman Catholic Religious Communities and their responses during the Holocaust. His forthcoming book is Behind Their Walls, The Hiding of Jews in Roman Catholic Religious Institutions in Franceis slated to be published in 2026. He is also the National Coordinator of EHRI-IL.

Lecture in English.

Register here.