In an earlier
post, I mentioned a challenge thrown out among one of my genealogy groups. The challenge, mentioned in
Family Tree Frog's blog, used the movie Poor Man's Orange which centers on a Catholic Irish Family.
When I went through ideas regarding a post, One of them was a post
about religion within my family. Then I thought about religion within my family and I have to admit, I never really think about it when thinking about my research on my family. I've always been told we're Catholics and no more or no less.
Hubby's Family
With my husband's family? This was a major hurdle due to the family's background on both sides and there's been many ideas and reasons why parts of his family have flip flopped. It makes from some really good debates and ideas which have been batted around each time its brought up. Think of a cat with a mouse on a rope - its the same idea as here. I'm not sure if hubby has blogged about it yet, but you can look to see if he has
here.
My Family- Paternal
Anyhow, getting back to my family. My paternal side I knew was Catholic because of the crosses in my grandmother's apartment she had when I was growing up. Further, my Uncle John, went to church every weekend hail or shine. I think the only weekends he hadn't gone was when he was really sick or they closed the roads. I still remember when I would stay with my grandmother, she would always say "John will be here after he goes to church." and she looked forward to those times. Sometimes I would even get to see my cousins if they were with him.
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| Part of St. Patrick's Church (Credit Picture: FB Group) |
When it came to my grandmother and uncle's funerals, they were at the same place -
St Patrick's in Newburgh, NY. I knew my uncle would have his services there, but to my knowledge I never saw my grandmother go to church which shocked me when I learned her services would be there too. It was only when I started doing my research I was told they allowed my grandmother to have her services there because of my uncle. She hadn't been to a service in years prior to her passing. Again, this was new to me.
Further, when I started to dig back into this part of my family history, I found my father had made his
communion when I was sent a picture of him when he was a little boy from his cousin who had it in some family pictures. I didn't know who it was until I sent it to my father asking and he replied back "Its ME!" and my mouth dropped open.
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| My Father in the late 1930's or Early 1940's (Credit: Cousin Krzysztof) |
Then when I found out the population of Polish people that were Roman Catholic I knew it had to be true. Add this to my finding my grandparent's 2nd marriage certificate in
St Monica's Catholic Church in NYC, and my great grandparent's marriage certificate, in Russian, in a Catholic Church. This one talks about church banns and how my great grandfather was of a different parish, but still had the banns done in BOTH churches. This was very unique apparently. This meant our association with the Catholic Church went back centuries on this side of our tree!
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| My Great Grandparents marriage record in Russian (Credit Polish Archives) |
My grandfather's side, even though he and my grandmother got married in a Catholic Church, could have converted over to Catholic. I haven't done much research on this side as yet, but it should be interesting to find out more.
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| St Monica's in NYC (Credit & Google) |
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| My grandparents wedding certificate with Church name (Credit NYC Archives) |
My Family- Maternal
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| Jules and Annie's headstone (Credit: Findagrave) |
Now onto my mother's side. On my mother's paternal side, her grandmother, Annie Larsen, I'm not sure what religion she was growing up, although
Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark was and is the
main one in Denmark - the country she comes from. Her and my great grandfather Jules, were married by a Justice of the Peace, so this wouldn't be a clue either. Lastly, I would like to add, while these were all facts, I know Jules was Catholic and they were both heavily into the church AND are actually buried on the church grounds -
St Mary's Church in Washingtonville, NY. It could be she converted or just started to follow the Catholic ways after they married.
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| Picture of St Mary's from their FB Page |
As I said, Annie married Jules in a civil ceremony. Jules has always been an interesting creature in my opinion. He was raised in Belgium until he was 1 by his mother who was a servant when she became pregnant. His father was drafted into Belgium's army as a rifleman. However, when he found out about Jules' mother having Jules, he married her. The documents were recorded like they were Roman Catholic and the
main religion in Belgium is Catholic. Besides, the documents I found going back to the 1700s all were Catholic in wording. Add this to him being heavily into the church in the USA and being buried with Annie and on the grounds of
St. Mary's Church in Washingtonville, NY and I could say the whole line is Catholic.
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| Jules' Birth Record and info on father from Belgium Archives |
Although, some of the cousins off of my line, were either in Catholic or in different religions which was interesting when I was looking at the different people. Some of these are below from a my cousin Jacqueline in Belgium.
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| Bertha Emma Barbara Verhaeghe known as Sister Maria Rufina |
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| Jean Amand Verhaeghe in his office at church before his death |
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| Picture of Oskar Verhaeghe as priest |
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| Pic of Remi Eugene Verhaeghe as priest |
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| Pic of Remi Leon Julien |
My mother's maternal line is a bit easier. I found my mother had made her
communion when we went through her box of papers. Inside a small bible was the picture of her as a little girl and I asked her about it. She didn't remember where, but confirmed it was at her communion. Then when I would go back and ask about her mother, she didn't or wouldn't say much at all. Talking to my cousins and other relatives, I found my grandmother - her mother - was committed in part because of her going around blessing everything she could see, touch, feel, etc. and this was every day and all day.
Then when I went back to my grandmother's mother, I found they were Roman Catholics and Polish. As I've already mentioned above, this was normal to the people of Poland in religion. As I found other cousins, we agreed with the Roman Catholic religion aspect and they had gone back farther - to the 1700s - and found the religion had gone back that far as well. What's even better, is with my grandmother's other siblings, they are still keeping with the religion - my cousin Jason goes, and a few of my mother's cousins and their children all go and are reverends and priests in the south of the US.
With my mother's grandfather, the questionable Apolonius Jagodzinski/Leo Barry/Leo Berry (among other names) I found he came from the
Galicia region of Poland. This is one of my brick walls as he changed names, and disappeared for periods of time which I found when I had is alien file pulled and sent to me.
My Takings
Growing up, mainly under my mother's care taking, I was told I was baptized (at
St. Patrick's) but never had really gone to church. Growing up, I called myself a Roman Catholic but was mainly a community religion type of person. If someone I was around was going to church, I'd go with them not caring which religion it was.
If asked if today I go to church, I would say honestly - No, I don't. Why? Mainly because when the times for service are on, I'm usually busy doing other things. If they were easier to get to (the churches are only here and there and I'd have to travel to get to a Roman Catholic one) and have times when it would be better for me to attend I would. I do try and catch the Pope's online services for main holidays though.
I never take or put anyone's religion against them. However, if they decided to try and use it as an excuse to do something bad or unjust, then that's something else altogether. However, religion is NOT to blame - the person is.
I learned this by doing research of countries histories in Europe - Like Poland. Before it was attacked, Poland was one of the places on earth that it didn't matter what religion -if any- you had and accepted your unconditionally. This is how it should be no matter what.
September 11th
I do have to put this in here as most people put religion in with this event.
In fact, when September 11th happened, I was working with a Muslim on a few problems we were having at work with a computer program. He stayed away about a week as everyone was having problems with emotions. I as just glad my family was safe and felt for others who weren't. Anyhow, he came in one day and I sat down and I went back to working with him just like before. He sat there and I could tell he wasn't comfortable. I asked what was going on and he told me he felt like I was blaming him.
I looked at him straight in the eye and asked him if he had anything to do with what happened even though I knew he hadn't. He said No. Then I asked him what the problem was then? His mouth dropped open in shock. I told him I knew he hadn't had anything to do with it and whatever was/is going on there would be figured out there, but didn't have anything to do with us and what we were doing. I could see he still wasn't convinced and I asked him what else I could do to make him more comfortable and he couldn't answer. I told him when he figured it out to let me know, but I didn't - and still don't - blame him. In fact, I felt bad for him because of what others did made him feel like he had to stay away from people. That's just wrong.
In Conclusion
Religion can be many things to all of us. Some people take the book, whichever they are using, and can use it for good or bad - just like anything. People use this for an excuse and that's all it is. An excuse.
You can read one thing and disagree with it and that's fine. However, what I'm seeing more and more is people disagreeing and then things turning nasty with name calling and being verbally attacked. That's just not something that should be done. Its not right. Different views on things (religion, political, taxes, traffic) makes us all different, but just because someone thinks or believes different things shouldn't make them a target for hate that's exploded in the last year.
And that just isn't right - at all. For anyone.
