Dear Readers,
In June many saintly celestial superstars are venerated and celebrated. In Italy and in Italian American homes the “onomastico” or Name Day, is often cause for a party and celebration. Many of the favorite people in my life are named Anthony or Tony. “Buon Onomastico” and “Buona Salute” on June 13th to all the Anthonys among my Readers and their families, too.
On June 13 all the Antonios, Tonys and Anthonys of the world can celebrate the feast of St. Anthony of Padua, a priest and gifted preacher born in Lisbon, Portugal. His surname comes from the Italian city of Padua, where he lived the later part of his life and died on June 13, 1231 at the age of thirty-six.
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Anthonys of the world who want to double-dip on “Onomastico” celebrations may want to also celebrate the Feast of St. Anthony the Abbot in January. I first became aware of St. Anthony the Abbot when a “cugino” called from Italy to wish my “marito Antonio” a “Buon Onomastico”. I just said “Grazie” but later decided to check him out. It seems that St. Anthony the Abbot is the patron saint of thepig.
St. Anthony Abbot is especially venerated in Piemonte where just across the border, the monks of St. Anthony Abbot founded a religious order in France at the beginning of the eleventh century, known as the Hospital Brothers of St. Anthony. These were pilgrimage centers for sufferers of many common diseases.
The Hospitallers wore black robes, with a Tau cross and went around asking for alms, accompanied, in the tradition of St. Anthony, by a pig. Around the neck of the animal was hung a bell that announced from afar the arrival of this curious pair of mendicants. The charitable work of the monks won them favor with the people and eventually the pigs of this Order were allowed to roam freely in the streets and woods to feed.
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S.F. Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone, lost his mother on May 8th, a few days before Mother’s Day. Mary Rose Cordileone died shortly after suffering a stroke. She was 90.
Archbishop Cordileone flew to San Diego from Lourdes, France, where he was making a pilgrimage with the Knights of Malta, and was able to be with her in the hours before she died, as were her three other children.
The Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated May 12 by Archbishop Cordileone, with many bishops and priests concelebrating, at Blessed Sacrament Church in San Diego, the church where she was married to her husband Leon in 1949, where her four children attended religious education classes and where she remained active throughout her life.
Mrs. Cordileone was a full-time wife, mother and homemaker for most of her life. She was an avid bowler and in her later years she enjoyed spending time with her family and friends. “She was loved by everyone who knew her”, her family said.
Mrs. Cordileone was born Mary Giardina in 1923 in Buffalo, N.Y., the oldest of four girls born to Sicilian immigrants Sam and Theresa Giardina.
In 1947, when she was 23, she moved to San Diego and worked for Challenge Dairy. She married Leon, a World War II Navy veteran who had gone into business with his three brothers as a commercial albacore fisherman, on November 13, 1949.
Leon, who was born in San Francisco to Sicilian immigrants, died at age 86 in 2005 after 55 years of marriage, but the couple was able to attend together their son Salvatore’s ordination as auxiliary Bishop of San Diego in 2002.
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Antonin Scalia, U.S. Supreme Court Justice, was appointed by President Reagan and began serving on the High Court in 1986, after being confirmed by the U.S. Senate 98 to 0. While attending Harvard Law School, he met his future wife, Maureen McCarthy, who attended Radcliffe College, on a blind date set up by a Jewish friend. They were married in 1960 and have 9 children. One son, Fr. Scalia, is an ordained priest in the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, so with Father’s Day coming up June 15th, Happy Father’s Day. By the way, while Mother’s Day is celebrated in May in the U.S. and in Italy, Father’s Day in Italy is celebrated on March 19th “La festa di San Giuseppe”. Justice Scalia’s father (not his grandfather) was born in Sicily.
When Salvatore Eugenio Scalia arrived in the U.S., he spoke very little English, but in time he mastered the language and as “Gene” Scalia, he received a doctorate from Columbia University. When Professor Gene Scalia was offered a position to teach Romance Languages at Brooklyn College in NYC, the Scalia family moved from Trenton, New Jersey to New York. Antonin’s mother, Catherine (nee) Panaro, the daughter of immigrants was a school teacher…
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