In an email reacting to my lecture on the Jesuits of Jewish origins at
the Jesuit Ricci Institute of Macau in November 2007, a Jesuit told
me briefl y the story of his Jewish lineage. While his other Sephardic
ancestors went to Istanbul, Baghdad, Tehran, and—through the Silk
Road—up to Shanghai, where they remained Jewish until today, both
his grandparents were descendants of Jews who settled in Palermo and
Trabia (Sicily), where they converted to Catholicism in order to survive
(in the baptismal registers, which are still extant, they are described
as “usurers”). Yet, they kept practicing Judaism secretly. From Friday
evening through Saturday evening, his grandfather would hide the
image of baby Jesus from a large framed picture of St. Anthony that
he kept in his home. It was, in fact, a wind-up music box. On Fridays
he would wind up the mechanism and push a button, so that Jesus
would disappear out of St. Anthony’s arms, hidden in the upper frame
of the picture. On Saturdays, he then would push the button again, so
that Jesus would come back out from hiding into St. Anthony’s arms.
As eldest son in his family, my correspondent was told this story by his
father (who passed away in 1979), who also had asked him to eat only
kosher food. None of his siblings was required to do so—they in fact
hide their origins, since they are a devout practicing Catholic family