I grabbed three thin candles from the stack of candles lying on top of a small table by the door. Mass at the country parish was sparsely attended. The priest blessed the candles and gave a brief homily on the presentation of Jesus in the temple.
During Mass I observed the faithful, pious elderly ladies. Only God had the privilege of knowing the prayers their lips mouthed during the consecration. More than one had a rosary in hand and fervently prayed it. As I knelt after receiving communion I thought, “In this very same church, almost 140 years ago, my great-great-great grandmother Maria Migone prayed just like these women. She prayed for the safety of her four sons as they sailed from Genoa to a better life in South America. She would never see her sons again.”
I spent the whole morning exploring the baptismal, marriage and death records of the parish. As I uncovered the past, a sense of belonging to the small town, in particular its parish church, increased deep within me. Records confirmed that ever since the late 1600s generations of my ancestors were baptized, married and buried at this parish church in Pieve Ligure. The same faith that led them to pray at San Michele parish had led me that morning to San Michele parish to pray. The same faith I profess today and pass on to others somehow already existed in this beautiful town centuries ago, and it reached me by means of my family, from one generation to the next.
When Don Andrea introduced me to some of the daily Mass attendees one of the ladies said, “I am sure one of your ancestors prayed right here to have a priest in the family, and here you are!” “Maybe so,” I thought, but immediately all doubt disappeared from my mind. “Yes, I am sure of it,” I said, “it must have been so.”