Sister Rose's Passion

Sister Rose Thering is a Catholic nun with chutzpah. Since the 1950s she has been asking, "If we love Jesus, who is Jewish, why don’t we love his people?" This Academy Award®-nominated film introduces us to the remarkable Sister Rose, who has made fighting anti-Semitism her life’s work. First challenging church doctrines that blame the Jews for the death of Jesus, she advocated to reform the portrayal of Jews in Catholic teaching materials nationwide.

Oren Jacoby, an Oscar® nominated filmmaker, has written, directed, and produced award-winning films for the BBC, ABC, VH-1, HBO, PBS, National Geographic, Discovery, Turner, NHK (Japan), and Human Rights Watch. In addition to working on Emmy and Dupont Gold Baton winning series, he has won CINE Golden Eagles, the Royal Television Society (UK) journalism award, as well as production grants from the American Film Institute, ITVS (The Independent Television Service) and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Most recently, he directed "Sister Rose’s Passion," nominated for an Academy Award in 2005 and winner of Best Documentary Short Film at the 2004 Tribeca Film Festival, as well as dramatic segments starring Brian Dennehy and Sam Waterston for "Decisions that Shook the World". Jacoby’s credits as director, producer and writer include: "Topdog Diaries" (PBS), featuring Don Cheadle, Jeffrey Wright and Suzan-Lori Parks; "The Shakespeare Sessions" (PBS), with the co-founders of the Royal Shakespeare Company and an all-star cast of American actors; "The Beatles Revolution" (ABC, VH-1, Apple,); "Swingin’ with Duke"(PBS), starring Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra; "Sam Shepard: Stalking Himself" (PBS); "The Power of an Idea" (Human Rights Watch); "Master Thief" (ABC); and "The Irish in America: Success" (PBS). He also wrote, produced and directed "The Return Ticket"; "Ghosts of the Bayou"; "Idols of the Game", featuring Michael Jordan; "Benny Goodman: Adventures in the Kingdom of Swing" for American Masters; and "The Second Russian Revolution," on the collapse of the USSR, called "the best BBC series of the decade." Jacoby has directed plays at the Theater for the New City, the Williamstown Theater Festival, the Ensemble Studio Theater, and regional theaters, including premieres of new works by Richard Dresser, Quincy Long, Richard Greenberg and Franz Xavier Kroetz. His stage adaptation of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man was performed in a reading at the 2004 Tribeca Theater Festival, in a co-production with the Classical Theater of Harlem. He is co-author with Forrest Stone of the original screenplay "Tarzan Brown" for the Oxford Film Company. He is a graduate of Brown University and the Directing Program of the Yale School of Drama.