Center for European Studies Seminar on Social Exclusion and Inclusion
Date and Time
Sacred Betrayal: How the French Catholic Church Broke Its Pledge to Protect Jews During the Holocaust
Speaker
- Aliza Luft, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of California, Los Angeles.
Description
Join Aliza Luft for a discussion of her book, Sacred Betrayal: How the French Catholic Church Broke Its Pledge to Protect Jews During the Holocaust (Harvard University Press, 2026). Drawing on years of archival research across four countries and three languages, Luft uncovers a gripping and often heartbreaking history of how religious and political leaders navigated the rise of Nazism and the collaborationist Vichy regime.
At the heart of the book is a simple but urgent question: How do people make decisions when the world around them is falling apart? Sacred Betrayal sheds new light on how genocide unfolds: through trust, misjudgment, and the quiet erosion of moral certainty, as much as through outright violence. It shows how institutions can blur the line between safety and danger, loyalty and betrayal. And it raises pressing questions about how societies respond to rising hatred today.
Co-sponsored by the Weatherhead Research Cluster on Comparative Inequality and Inclusion.