Catholic Church Worldwide

Pondering the question of if I see the Catholic Church as a Roman or a worldwide I would have to say I view it as worldwide but its core in Rome. Growing up in a big Catholic family and attending a Catholic school from kindergarten to senior year of high school I have learned a lot about Catholicism and the Catholic Church. However, just being in Rome for a couple months has added so much more to my knowledge on the Catholic Church and different views of it.

Before coming to Rome I knew that the Catholic Church’s core is in Rome. Rome is where the Vatican City is which is where the Pope resides who is the leader of the Catholic Church thus the core of the Catholic Church is in Rome. I sometimes was disgusted with what I have learned about past Popes and how they wanted to treated as kings and how they just cared about power and wealth, which is not at all what the Catholic Church stands for. With the past Popes acting like that it scared some people away and of the Catholic Church and made them not want Catholicism in their country. The United States was one of those countries that was scared of the Pope and was not sure how they felt about having Catholic Churches and him having some power in their country.

I say that the Catholic Church is worldwide and not just Roman because there are Catholic Churches all over the world and Catholics all over the world. However, as I have noticed in my small town, through school years growing up, visiting different places growing up and now at college that being Catholic means different things to Americans and Italians. I have viewed in America that only in certain places such as when I am on retreats or at certain masses that Americans take being Catholic seriously and take pride in it. Whereas in Italy I can clearly see Italians and people on pilgrimages take their Catholic pride to a whole new level. I have seen hard core devotion to a faith on retreats back home but I have never seen hard core faith like I do here in Italy. These Italians and people on pilgrimages are so devoted to their faith and it makes me want to be more set in my faith with them.

Moving away from comparing Italians to American and the Catholic Church I am going now talk about the Pope. Even if this sounds silly I feel like I have a stronger core to my religion after seeing the Pope with my classmates and professors. I never thought I would meet and/or see in real life any man that was Pope in my time. There was a since of realism when I saw the Pope that made my faith feel even more alive. Never in my life have I ever seen so many people excited to be Catholic. There was so much joy in the room prior, during and after seeing the Pope. Everyone in there was from different countries from all over the world and they were all there to celebrate one thing and that was being Catholic. This gave me the sense that no matter where a person is from they still love the same God and same religion with all of their heart, which connects all of us that belong to the same faith and believe in the same God which to me is very cool. Like I said before I have been on retreats but never in my life have I seen so much love for God and being Catholic as I have when I am in Italy.