Monday, April 23, 2007

Book: " Priest, Parish, and People: Saving the Faith in Philadelphia's "Little Italy" by Richard N. Juliani

The ANNOTICO Report

 

RICHARD N. JULIANI is professor of sociology at Villanova University, and one of the most devoted Academics to Italian American History, and is the foremost Historian on Italian Americans in Philadelphia. Previous books by Juliani are "Italian Americans: The Search for a Usable Past";  "The Italians in Philadelphia";  "Building Little Italy: Philadelphia's Italians Before Mass Migration"; "New Explorations in Italian American Studies; Family and Community Life of Italian Americans";  "Building Little Italy";  among others.

 

 

Priest, Parish, and People

Saving the Faith in Philadelphia's "Little Italy"

By Richard N. Juliani

 

* From the perspective of historical sociology, Richard N. Juliani traces the role of religion in the lives and communities of Italian

immigrants in Philadelphia between 1870 and 1920.

 

By the end of the nineteenth century, Philadelphia had one of the largest Italian populations in the country. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia eventually established twenty-three parishes for the exclusive use of Italians.

 

Juliani describes the role these parishes played in developing and anchoring an ethnic community and in shaping its members' new identity as Italian Americans during the years of mass migration from Italy to America.

 

"Priest, Parish, and People" blends the history of Monsignor Antonio Isoleripastor from 1870 to 1926 of St. Mary Magdalen dePazzi, the first Italian parish founded in the countrywith that of the Italian immigrant community in Philadelphia.

 

Relying on parish and archdiocesan records, secular and church newspapers, archives of religious orders, and Father Isoleri's personal papers, Juliani chronicles the history of St. Mary Magdalen dePazzi as it grew from immigrant refuge to a large, stable,

ethnic community that anchored "Little Italy" in South Philadelphia.

 

 In charting that growth, Juliani also examines conflicts between laity and clergy and between clergy and church hierarchy, as well as the remarkable fifty-six-year career of Isoleri as a spiritual and secular leader. "Priest, Parish, and People"  provides both the details of parish history in Philadelphia and the larger context of Italian-American  Catholic history.

 

 

Priest, Parish, and People

Saving the Faith in Philadelphia's "Little Italy"

By Richard N. Juliani

 

"This is a well-written, in-depth study of Philadelphia's Italian Catholic community. Focusing on a parish and its remarkable pastor, it chronicles the progress of an Italian immigrant parish from its earliest days in the mid-nineteenth century to its emergence as the social and religious center for the Italian community in the early twentieth century. For the author, writing this history was clearly a labor of love. He has provided all of us with a chapter in the history of Philadelphia Catholicism that was long overdue."

-Jay P. Dolan, author of In Search of an American Catholicism: A History of Religion and Culture in Tension

 

"While Priest, Parish, and People is in itself a rich ethnographic story about a most unusual priest, a particular Philadelphia parish, and the growth of parishes to meet the needs of a rapidly growing immigrant population, it is also an important story of the struggle between Irish and Italian cultures in the assimilation process, and an interesting insight into church politics and the workings of the Roman Catholic Church." -William V. D'Antonio, Catholic University of America

 

"Rich in detail and culled from an array of primary sources, including the extensive writings of the second pastor of St. Mary Magdalen dePazzi, Richard Juliani weaves a masterful story. By tracing the nuanced interconnections between this first Italian national parish in the United States, its formidable pastor, and the growing immigrant community in South Philadelphia, this book provides new insights about Americanization and the formation of ethnic identity." -Joan Saverino, Ph.D., The Historical Society of Pennsylvania

 

"Exhaustively researched, thoroughly detailed, and highly incisive in its analysis, Juliani's book represents the benchmark study of the Italian immigrant parish, if not of the Italians' encounter with American Catholicism in general. It will become recognized as a unique and valuable contribution to the historiography of immigrant life, and will surely challenge scholars in religious studies, immigrant and ethnic history, and community research to examine and re-think the complex issues and arguments raised by the author." -Nunzio Pernicone, Drexel University

 

Kathryn Pitts

University of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana 46556

574.631.3267 phone

574.631.4410 fax

 

 

The ANNOTICO Reports Can be Viewed and are Fully Archived at:

Italia USA: http://www.ItaliaUSA.com (Formerly Italy at St Louis)

 

The ANNOTICO Reports Can be Viewed at

 

Annotico Email: annotico@earthlink.net