The Italian "national canon" and Roman Catholicism: some remarks about Alberto Banti’s Sublime madre nostra

Journal title SOCIETÀ E STORIA
Author/s Daniele Menozzi
Publishing Year 2015 Issue 2014/145
Language Italian Pages 5 P. 523-527 File size 501 KB
DOI 10.3280/SS2014-145006
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The new book by Alberto Banti, Sublime madre nostra, is an important scientific contribution to the historical literature inspired by the 150th anniversary of the Italian unification. Its central theses - asserting that the Italian national discourse was based upon some deep rhetorical figures: the nation as sacral community, as network of kinship relations, as a gendered community - invite a comparison with the tenets of the Roman catholic Church on the same subjects. The present discussion focuses on three moments: the pamphlet Della nazionalità published by the Jesuit Luigi Taparelli d’Azeglio in the year 1847; the opinions expressed by leading Italian Catholics - especially bishop Angelo Bartolomasi, head of military chaplains - during the Great War; the nexus between religion and nation in the Catholic literature endorsing the Italian aggression to Ethiopia. This reconstruction aims to show the differences - but also some similarities - between the catholic position and the "national canon" handed down by the Italian Risorgimento.

Keywords: Nation; Myth; Catholicism; Historiography; Alberto Banti.

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Daniele Menozzi, Mito nazionale e cattolicesimo italiano: l’apporto di "sublime madre nostra" di alberto banti in "SOCIETÀ E STORIA " 145/2014, pp 523-527, DOI: 10.3280/SS2014-145006