Catholic Ghetto?

[Bob_Aliano]

The Amish, Eastern Orthodox or Orthodox Jewish would not be recognisable as such if they did not maintain a degree of separation, they are able to persist under the onslaught because they kept their guard up and kept outside influences outside through the enforcement of strict laws governing how the community interacts with the outside such as the Amish laws which do not permit electricity or telephones in their homes. By restricting access to television, radio, and telephones, the Amish are better able to keep the modern world from intruding into their home life. Not to mention the law forbidding them to marry anyone who is not Amish.

You might find this interesting:

holycrosslivonia.org/amish/q_and_a_no2.htm

That is a very good article.

In my visits to Pennsylvania and Iowa I have encountered a fair number of Amish and Mennonites and found them to be very friendly, on the other hand I never attempted to enter their culture. Based on the link I would have to say the Amish probably fit more into the closed society than I originally portrayed however, based on my personal experience, I found them much more friendly and welcoming than the Polish Catholic community I mentioned earlier. I suspect the difference is the Amish have confidence in themselves where the Polish community seemed overly suspicious, almost afraid of any outsider.

For the record, the Amish in Pennsylvania do allow limited use of gasoline engines to power such as devices as washing machines and a few other farm machines and they will seek the assistance of non-Amish friends when a truck or heavy equipment is required.

 

[manualman]

The Amish, Orthodox Jews and Eastern Orthodox communities have survived in the face of cultures at odds with their beliefs precisely BECAUSE they have always cultivated in their young people a sense of the separateness of their own beliefs and culture from the larger culture that surrounded them.

When catholics left the so-called ghetto, they seemed to also leave behind any sense that the faith inherently means being somewhat different than the world around us. No wonder so many catholics uncritically accept Oprah values instead of catholic ones.

 

[Bob_Aliano]

The Amish, Orthodox Jews and Eastern Orthodox communities have survived in the face of cultures at odds with their beliefs precisely BECAUSE they have always cultivated in their young people a sense of the separateness of their own beliefs and culture from the larger culture that surrounded them.

When catholics left the so-called ghetto, they seemed to also leave behind any sense that the faith inherently means being somewhat different than the world around us. No wonder so many catholics uncritically accept Oprah values instead of catholic ones.

I still don’t think the tendency of immigrant Catholics to stay around their ethnic groups is enough to describe those groups as ghetto, sounds like an acedemic need to label everything. My grandparents learned English but it took a fair amount of time, there were no ESL classes at the local High School back then. We were not even allowed to speak Polish or Italian around the house, something I deeply regret as an adult. Everyone took Naturalization classes before becoming citizens.

Of course they stayed around those with whom they could communicate easily, no surprise there! Once they felt more comfortable on their own they drifted away from the cultural group save for membership in the Polish-American and Italian-American clubs, where else can you find weekly Polka dances or a place to play bocce.

The religious binding influence was the parish church and when VII was instituted that cohesion started to fall off, seems vernacular meant English rather than Polish or Italian. The Polish and French churches were sold by the Apb. of Boston about two years ago to cover the heavy losses from the pedophilia suits while the Italian church succumbed to a new Federal Center decades ago.