Roman Inquisition and Index

The Secret Archive of the Vatican

Behind the thick walls of the Congregation of the Doctrine of Faith, better known as the Inquisition, lay acts that have been stored for over 500 years. It was the acts of its little sister, the Congregation of the Index, which made the Vatican's black list: The Index of Forbidden Books.

Since the opening of these forbidden archives in 1998, only a few scholars have access to the case records. Together with church historian Professor Hubert Wolf, the story of the Index is unrolled for the first time in television – the most important secret trials in the struggle over right and wrong.

It is a controversial history that to this day has not lost its explosive nature. What the printing press made possible hundreds of years ago is now achieved by the internet, a new gateway to information. Critical journalist Wolf von Lojewski guides the journey into the Vatican’s history of censorship and poses up-to-date questions. When will freedom of opinion, an accomplishment of our civilization, become a risk? In whose hands is this decision?

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ZDF