The "Jewish cardinal'? Aron Jean-Marie Lustiger (1926-2007)

Abstract

Cardinal Aron Jean-Marie Lustiger died at the age of 80 in 2007. Archbishop of Paris from 1981 to 2005, he was a towering and controversial public figure, both within the Catholic church and in European society more broadly. Since his death, he has remained a subject of intense interest. This essay will analyse two films about him - the 2012 documentary Aron Jean-Marie Lustiger (Jean-Yves Fischbach) and the 2013 fiction film Le Métis de Dieu (Ilan Duran Cohen) - as prisms through which the thought, policies and achievements of Lustiger can be examined and assessed. Primarily a charismatic man of faith, Lustiger was also widely engaged with the history of his times. It will be argued that his..