On the first Sunday of each month, museums in Florence extend free admission to all patrons and, still being full of energy on our second day in Italy, my roommates and I elected to wake up super early and see Michelangelo’s David at the Galleria dell’Accademia right when it opened. Thanks to our advanced planning, we ended up in the first group allowed in for the day and quickly turned a corner beyond the entrance to find David standing before us. After taking some time to appreciate the true majesty of this famous sculpture with our own eyes, we moved on to perusing the rest of the museum. This browsing experience marked my very first “wow” or “aha” moment of the trip, because despite the great variety in this museum’s collection of everything from other mythology-based sculptures to musical instruments of the Renaissance period, the overwhelmingly present motif in most of the featured art was that of a crucifix. This prevalence of Catholic expression persisted throughout the remainder of my first week as my class spent time at the Church of Santa Croce. During these visits, it sunk in for me that I was truly in a different country—a country rich in an ethnoreligion that I was not accustomed to.
Growing up in America, a country with a culture that champions religious freedom, the separation of church and state was ever-present throughout my childhood. This presence made itself evident both in large-scale ways like the religious diversity of my hometown, and in smaller-scale ways like my own secular upbringing. To this day, because of how I was raised, I don’t consider myself very religious, and I am grateful to have grown up in a country where that is not only permitted but quite common too. Being in Italy, however, has changed my perspective a bit and I’ve steadily gained a greater respect and appreciation for a different kind of culture. Conversely to America, Italy as a sovereign nation was built on the unity of church and state and, therefore, has traces of Catholicism in everything from its art to its schools. These traces, obvious or not, bring the people of Italy together and enrich their culture every day.
The following weekend, I took a trip to Rome and was lucky enough to be present at the Vatican for Pope Leo XIV’s first-ever noon address. Being in Italy for that once-in-a-lifetime experience truly solidified in my mind that there is undeniable merit to the unity of church and state in Italy.
