SAN GERVASIO E PROTASIO

      I woke with a start at 6AM and looked out the port window just in time to catch a glimpse of a boat through the morning mist entering the lagoon.  I packed my computer bag and went to the upper deck to watch as the ship entered into the wetland and made its way slowly toward a city that was already fast at work.        

     Whether sunlit and featured in a parade of color, or subdued by a veiled mist as it was that morning, the city of Venice is always a picture waiting to be taken.   

       At 8 o’clock we put into the port where I bid a final farewell to my home for the past five days and its Greek crew, anxious now to set out on an adventure in search of the two churches that promised to offer more information about my Venetian ancestry.  In our haste to leave Trieste, though, getting the church’s addresses had slipped through a crack, and with over a hundred churches scattered throughout the city’s six sestiere (subdivisions) finding them last minute would  prove challenging at the very least.

     ~

      The port’s mini-van was waiting near the ship to transport passengers to the tram. The young Italian driver spoke good English so before he had a chance to put the vehicle into gear I leaned over the seat and presented him the paper upon which the church names were written and asked if he knew where they were.  The eleventh century church, San Gervasio E Protasio (the church of my great-grandparents, Adrianna Guarinoni and Francesco Abele) rang a bell and he gave my friend and me the general location and told us which water taxi to take.  The other church was unfamiliar to him. 

    

       An hour or so and a long boat ride later my friend and I were standing in front of a water taxi shed where a street musician was playing his accordian, wondering in which direction of the waterway to go, and whether the mini-van driver had indeed sent us to the right place.

      We set out blindly, my friend stopping to make inquiries that brought more blank stares and negative nods than not until finally, a woman pointed us in the direction of a nearby neighborhood.

      Before long we found ourselves standing in front of a narrow street alongside a canal.

There, we entered into a neighborhood that belonged more to its residents than to the noisy tourists that invaded the other streets and canals of Venice.  

At the base of an arched bridge a door lay open to an old store left over from another century, the allure of what lie within demanding further investigation. 

Across from the same bridge the eleventh century church where my grandfather was baptized in 1870 hugged the canal. “That’s it," my friend exclaimed through a sigh of relief, "San Gervasio E Protasio, the church of your grandfather!" 

Words cannot describe the thrill of that moment, or the immediacy with which  my over-active imagination carried me on a journey into the past.  I saw the child of my grandfather running along the building-choked street to the old store where he stood at the counter with a few lire in hand; kneeled beside a confessional confessing a young boy’s sins to a parish priest at the church I would soon enter; rowing a boat with his father along the canal for a day excursion to another part of the city. Each vision warmed me and strengthened the attachment to my Venetian heritage.

     We had found the church, and in that we were victorious.  But there was no guarantee that we’d find a priest inside to help us.  Furthermore, our visit could be in vain if, in fact, the words imparted by the genealogist (which I’d found difficult to accept at the time) at the Mormon Church in Trieste had been accurate.  “Even if you find a priest at either of the churches,” he had said, “they could be resistant… possibly uncooperative because you are a woman.”  Be that as it may, I was there, and for the moment, that was enough.

~

       The church was empty of life but for a young man operating a floor washing machine, its sound echoing in the vastness of ceilings and marble-columned walls. 

 

I stopped beneath a massive pipe organ to momentarily study my surroundings, looking down the rows of heavy wooden pews past the antique, stand alone confessional

to the elaborately appointed alter dominated on either side by an old master’s paintings with its lifelike images. 

 I could feel the cool radiating from the floors and marble walls; smell the burning candle wax that permeated the air.  It was, I thought, my family’s church, and I found great comfort in that knowledge.  

       My friend interrupted my moment urging me on toward another alter where she had spotted an open door and a small group of people gathered on the other side. We’re in luck, I thought.  Since there are people, there has to be a priest attending to them.  We approached and entered just in time to see a priest exiting to another room.  I felt my heartbeat quicken, my excitement heighten.  My friend was not shy and approached the middle-aged priest who now stood behind a desk.  Although I could not understand all of what they were saying, I could tell by his strained expression, the sharpness of his tone and hurried manner, that his mind was elsewhere. My friend persisted, though, until finally he capitulated handing her his card and allowing her to write some information on a piece of paper that she placed on the desk in front of him.  Upon that we took our cue and left.

      A few moments later as I was walking toward the back of the church I encountered the priest and the floor washer talking.  The priest looked up at me just long enough to render another of his unpleasant looks.  In a gruff voice he issued a warning in Italian, “Don't step on the wet floor.” Stunned by his comment, I drew back and walked in the other direction. 

     Later when I asked my friend to elaborate on their rushed conversation, she summed it up by saying: “He wasn’t very pleasant and wanted to know who I was and why an American woman wanted baptismal information from his church.  He was less than cooperative saying that he was in a hurry, a very busy man, and although he did not deny my request to search the records for old documents, said it was a difficult task.” 

      Although I understood that we came to his church without an appointment and caught him at a bad time, he could at least have shown some compassion for my situation which had been explained to him in detail.  He was, after all, a man of God, and bound to a duty to serve all of God’s children, even the American ones. And why on earth would he be reluctant to share the records that were purposely left and kept over the centuries, in part, for the benefit of future generations?  In short, he left me with nothing but a phone number and a bad taste in my mouth. The genealogist at the Mormon Church had been right after all. 

      It was nearing 10AM, time to ride a water taxi to another sestiere and  tromp its streets in search of Giovanna's church.  What, if anything, awaited us?               .