Child and Cross

Child and Cross from the beginning puts children in the center, listening to how they perceive the man on the cross. Three initial chapters trace the life of this Jesus bar Abbas according to highly respected sources, in a very human, down-to-earth way from mother's womb to rebels' cross. How the picture of the rabbi's deadly torture became the obsessive icon of the West and in an "automatic and preconscious" way (Melvin Lerner) continues working as the learning tool for Jew-hate is explained thanks to the sensitivity of psychologists like Søren Kierkegaard, Jean Piaget and Helena Antipoff, exposed in 73 pictures. The return of Passion details in Christian views of Jews, the reenactment of those scaring details in thousand years of "just punishment", racism as product of inquisition, the still solid cross taboo in Germany, the complex of cross and Zionism and the kafkaesque cross judgement of the European Court for Human Rights in Strasbourg are examined while the human obsession with sacrifice itself gets analyzed in "The Lamb on Cross" whose pegged legs shaped western use of animals more than this Nazarene who in his last action fought precisely animal sacrifice.
The final exam "Why Johanna fed him vanilla cake and other child's play questions" intends to sensitize the reader once again concerning the child & cross issue, well in accordance with the Galilean who "called a child and set him in their midst ..."

Thus Child and Cross is mainly
a) an exemplary study about the power of visual images and for respecting children's empathic ways of viewing this world;
b) a consistent, comprising and explaining analysis of anti-Judaism by taking serious those human beings that academic research of "anti-Semitism" deems too small and childish to deal with;
c) a contribution to Christian-Muslim-Jewish dialogue by detailed elaboration of not only the Christian symbol's role in the anti-Judaism that led to Zionism and thus to Gaza, but also of the connecting potential of this man from Galilee whom Matthew (27:16-17 in original Greek wording) calls Jesus bar Abbas; and
d) a human rehabilitation of this Bar Abbas ("Son of Father") and his relatives, especially his brother Judas.

Konrad Yona Riggenmann was born in 1952 and finished his actively Catholic youth only in Augsburg major seminary. With a thesis about Bertolt Brecht he became a teacher in public school, staging plenty and publishing a dozen plays for school and amateur theater in the style of his prizewinning 1994 emigrant drama New Heimat. Graduated in 2001 on John Dewey's impact in Brazilian school, he in 2002 won the right to teach cross-free at a Munich court. In three own books plus one co-authored by Richard L. Rubenstein, Irving Greenberg, Cardinal Lehmann and Pope Benedict, the Flechtheim Prize awardee researched how to learn Jew-hatred. After emigration in 2011, a genetic test in 2012 evinced his DNAncestors among those Portuguese Marranos who back then viewed the Promised Land where he now wrote this book: in Brazil.
K.Y. Riggenmann nasceu em 1952 e concluiu a sua mocidade católica ativa só no seminário maior. Tornou-se professor de escola pública com tese de admissão sobre Bertolt Brecht e publicou 12 peças para teatro escolar e amador, seu drama New Heimat sobre emigrantes suábios e judeus sendo premiado em 1994. Pós-graduado em 2001 com tese sobre a influência de John Dewey na escola brasileira, em 2002 um tribunal muniquense após 7 anos lhe permitiu ensinar sem cruz. Honrado pela União Humanista com o Prêmio Flechtheim, em três livros próprios e um junto com Irving Greenberg, Richard Rubenstein, Cardeal Lehmann e Papa Benedito ele inquiriu como se aprende o ódio aos judeus. Emigrado em 2011, em 2012 um teste genético provou seus DNAncestrais entre aqueles marranos portugueses que na época buscaram a Terra Prometida onde ele escreveu o livro: no Brasil.
K.Y. Riggenmann kam 1952 zur Welt und beschloss seine aktiv katholische Jugend erst im Augsburger Priesterseminar. Mit einer Arbeit über Bertolt Brecht wurde er Volksschullehrer, publizierte 12 Stücke für Schul- und Amateurtheater wie sein 1994 preisgekröntes Emigrantenstück New Heimat. Promoviert in 2001 über John Deweys Wirkung in Brasiliens Schule, bekam er 2002 in München nach sieben Prozessjahren das Recht, kreuzfrei zu lehren. In drei Büchern plus einem zusammen mit u.a. Richard L. Rubenstein, Irving Greenberg, Kardinal Lehmann und Papst Benedikt untersuchte der Flechtheim-Preisträger, wie Judenhass gelernt wird. Nach Emigration in 2011 erwies ein Gentest in 2012 seine DNAhnen unter jenen portugiesischen Marranos, die das Gelobte Land dort suchten wo er dieses Buch schrieb: in Brasilien.