Religion happens to be a interesting topic among my Italian friends and family. Many are obviously raised Catholic .My family in the beginning was no different. My great grandparents went to Catholic church in Mattie Italy and were married there. They came to America and found Saint Anthony's in downtown Renton. http://www.st-anthony.cc/ there they raised their Children in the church. God fearing people they were. They were poor had 9 mouths to feed and really began to question giving their money to the church, who guilted them.To be a good Catholic you must give, yes? Over the years great grandfather Luigi turned his back on god and the church , for he felt god turned his back on him. Melania eventually did the same. Their kids by then were grown and had children of their own and many of them kept the practice of Catholicism.Not all, my father went to school at Saint Anthony as a kid, but his father my grandpa was a non practicing Catholic since WW11.. but when my father was grown he questioned more.. and the religions of the world.He married my mother a Pentecostal , and it was in very southern style pentecostal. The speaking of tounges and fainting in church"Praise the Lord" My father found great energy in this style of religion and passed this onto my brother and I in our child years. I recall several times standing on a street corner with my father while he preached to the passing folks about the god he had found, I wasn't even three.
I became the best of friends with a nice girl of my age named Sarah who was mostly Native American and who happened to go to Catholic church... obviously not her native religion. As kids on Sundays we would walk a few blocks down from here house to the Catholic Church. We attended together and together we took the blood and body of Christ. Once my parents discovered I had ventured out of their church.. the pentecostal I was put down . Told Catholics were evil, dirty , and God was mad at me. Even at 10 this made no sense to me.. but I was god fearing, I listened. Regardless I never went again with Sarah after the secret was out. I was baptized pentecostal at 11 and sometime after this I rebelled and refused to go to Church. I was finally released at the age of 13 from having to go every Sunday.I once was torchered into going to a Christian camp when I had ran away from home, a woman at my parents church said " god told me she must go in my dream last night". I never felt a connection with the "god" or religion my parents had found. This is when i became a believer of nothing.
It was Six months ago I felt a tug at my heart when I first moved to Pullman WA. The town is small and there is many Churches but the most beautiful of all that caught my eye was the Catholic church. We decided as a family we would all go try this new thing to us,"religion".Sunday at 10 am we walked up the steps and the eyes of the priest periced through me. He knew we were coming we had emailed him, but I felt this man was judging my very soul and it was frightening. The smell was ancient. I knew I was in the right place, but I was not ready for the feelings, was this my native religion? Yes ,I could feel it. 3o mins into service we walked out with hair standing on end.
My father was Catholic before Pentecostal and before what he is now ,Agnostic .My grandfather was a non practicing Catholic, and his Parents and them before them and so forth..
4 comments:
Questioning religion is so tough! I'm a third Generation Italian Catholic and of course was raised with a really strong Catholic upbringing, but once I got to a certain age and began thinking for myself how Catholicism fit in with the rest of the world, it became increasingly difficult to just accept what was being spoon fed to me without asking some questions. It also didn't help that one of my best high school friends turned out to be Buddhist. Oh man, that did not sit too well with my pastor; therefore, I ended up being turning away myself from my faith. And that's ok! I don't often go to Church, but I've realize that that doesn't make one a good/bad person. I'm so happy you know so much about your family, I need to start asking my own family more of these great questions!
Si, Grazie
I added you as a link, do you mind?
OMG I never knew this!! Last time I saw you, didn't you say that Even before the Catholic religion, the Italians were very tribal and connected to the land!
I do agree that the Catholic church has the essence of home!!
Yes my family and Northern Italy were Celts, but it was around 400 BC, once the Romans had taken place, Roman catholic was spread all across.
""The first historical recorded encounter of a people displaying the cultural traits associated with the Celts comes from northern Italy around 400 BC, when a previously unkown group of barbarians came down from the Alps and displaced the Etruscans from the fertile Po valley, a displacment that helped to push the Etruscans from history's limelight. The next encounter with the Celts came with the still young Roman Empire, directly to the south of the Po. The Romans in fact had sent three envoys to the beseiged Etruscans to study this new force. We know from Livy's The Early History of Rome that this first encounter with Rome was quite civilized"""
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