Sanctuary from the Holocaust? Roman Catholic Conversion of Jews in Bucharest, Romania, 1942

Abstract

Faced with increasing persecution, some Romanian Jews converted to Christianity before and during the Holocaust. While the Romanian authorities enforced the March 1941 law banning conversions, for various political reasons conversion to Roman Catholicismwas treated differently. The papal nuncio to Romania, Monsignor Andrea Cassulo, as well as some specific Roman Catholic churches (the article looks at two in Bucharest) were willing to convert Jews as a way of helping them escape victimization. Yet the modest number of baptisms and the persistent allegations that they were performed in exchange for money suggest that, despite the political conditions that might have spurred conversions, the Catholic Church in Romania did not convert on a large scale, and that the initiative itself remained controversial.