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The Mortara Case: Parental Authority and Thomas Aquinas

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In 1858, six-year-old Edgardo Mortara is forcibly removed from his family’s home in accordance with civil and canon law. His Jewish family’s legal appeal invokes, to great effect, the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas. Dr. Matthew Tapie and former Heights teacher Dr. Lionel Yaceczko join us this week to pull apart this difficult case with the assistance of St. Thomas, who gives a theological basis for parental authority in accordance with natural law—a useful perspective for our culture today.

Chapters:

4:06 The Mortara Case (1858)
11:12 The personality of an original document
15:23 The Mortaras’ appeal to Thomas Aquinas
17:13 Handling difficult history
21:36 Thomas Aquinas: natural law and parental duties
33:39 Parallel roles of educator, translator
39:07 Gradual handoff of parental authority to the child
46:06 Why the Mortara Case resurfaces today

Links:

The Mortara Case and Thomas Aquinas’s Defense of Jewish Parental Authority by Dr. Matthew Tapie

Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues by Alasdair MacIntyre

Kidnapped: The Abduction of Edgardo Mortara movie (2023)

Also on the Forum:

The Importance of Ugly History by Mark Grannis

Featured opportunities:

Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025)

Convivium for Teaching Men at The Heights School (November 13-15, 2025)

About the Authors

Dr. Matthew Tapie

Dr. Tapie is Associate Professor of Theology, and Director of the Center for Catholic-Jewish Studies at Saint Leo University, Saint Leo, Florida. His teaching and research interests are in the thought of Thomas Aquinas, Judaism and Christian theology, moral theology, and Catholic-Jewish relations. From 2012-2014, Dr. Tapie was a Visiting Assistant Professor of Theology at The Catholic University of America, and was appointed a research fellow at CUA’s Institute for Interreligious Study and Dialogue. He has also taught Christian Ethics at Georgetown University, and Loyola University Maryland.

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Lionel Yaceczko

Latin, Greek
Lionel Yaceczko holds a BA from the University of Dallas, where he wrote a thesis on Propertius, and a MA and Ph.D. from The Catholic University of America. His dissertation on education in the Roman Empire led to the publication of his book Ausonius Grammaticus (Gorgias Press, 2021). He is also the author of an introductory Latin textbook, Jeromeâ€...
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