After World War II, a Polish Catholic couple named the Yachowitches (or similar spelling) had hidden and raised a young Jewish boy named Shachne (or Schachne) Hiller (later known as Stanley Berger) during the Holocaust. His Jewish parents had entrusted him to them for safety, with the explicit wish that—if they did not survive—he should be returned to his Jewish relatives or raised in his Jewish faith.
In 1946 (or around that time), the foster mother, Josefa Yachowitch, approached a newly ordained priest named Karol Wojtyła in Kraków. She wanted him to baptize the boy so he could be raised fully as a Catholic.
Wojtyła asked detailed questions:
About the boy’s background and parents.
Specifically, what the biological parents had wished for the child’s future.
When he learned the parents had asked for the boy to be returned to Jewish relatives or his Jewish faith, he refused to perform the baptism. He told the woman it would be wrong/unfair to baptize the child against the parents’ known wishes and natural justice, and he instructed her to seek out Jewish relatives or organizations to return the boy instead.
The boy was eventually reunited with Jewish family members (he was adopted and grew up in the United States as Stanley Berger). Years later, after Wojtyła became Pope John Paul II in 1978, the foster mother wrote to Berger revealing the identity of the priest who had blocked the baptism.
Later Confirmation
The story gained wider attention in Jewish circles and was recounted by figures like Rabbi Israel Meir Lau (former Chief Rabbi of Israel), who mentioned it in a meeting with John Paul II. The Pope reportedly confirmed details and even knew the boy’s name and whereabouts.
This anecdote is often cited as an early example of John Paul II’s respect for Judaism and sensitivity to Jewish identity, especially in the context of post-Holocaust Catholic-Jewish relations. It contrasts sharply with historical controversies like the 19th-century Edgardo Mortara case (where Pope Pius IX refused to return a secretly baptized Jewish boy to his family).
