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In a cinema in south-west Germany an audience is gathered to watch an Oscar winning film, Zone of Interest, about the life of Rudolf Höss, Commandant of Auschwitz. Those present comprise Jewish people from around the world and the special guest is Rudolf’s grandson. For years Kai Höss didn’t talk about his past and the topic was rarely visited in his childhood. It was only after a school history lesson that Kai began to comprehend Rudolf’s role as head of the largest mass murder site in history. In this Heart and Soul for ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ World Service Heart reporter Shiroma Silva travels to his home in Germany to interrogate Kai on his personal struggle. She tracks Kai’s outlook today through Christianity, in which he uses his past to look forward and understand the particular place of Jewish people in the Bible. He questions how anti-Semitism thrived in Christian societies and his grandfather’s early life in a devout Catholic family. Awaiting execution at Nuremberg in 1947, Rudolf Höss returned to Catholicism, regretting his unquestioning pursuit of Nazi ideology and crimes against humanity, but little was said about the Jewish prisoners who made up the majority of the dead at Auschwitz. Today his grandson speaks to Jewish communities globally and Shiroma Silva talks to Pastor Kai Höss as he seeks to disabuse congregations of the thinking that has all too often blamed Jewish people for all the worlds’ ills, instead describing himself as a Gentile who’s been saved by Jewish leaders.

Producer / Presenter: Shiroma Silva
Executive Producer: Rajeev Gupta
Editor: Chloe Walker
Production Coordinator: Mica Nepomuceno