Spirituality and Religion in Experiences of Italian American Daughters Grieving Their Fathers

Religion, spirituality, family relationships, death, grief, and mourning typically occupy places of great consequence in Italian American families, and Giordano, McGoldrick, and Klages (2005) have noted that "Italians tend to keep their dead with them" (p. 623). This aligns with current views on mourning and loss that emphasize continuing bonds and connections, as well as perspectives on the connection between religion and spirituality and loss and grief, including the importance of culture in grief and mourning. Yet despite a large Italian American population, little has been written in the psychological literature about Italian American culture, families, spirituality or religion, and approach to death and mourning. This article examines those issues through the Italian American father/daughter relationship, focusing on the daughters' grief after their fathers' deaths, particularly on how religion and/or spirituality were or were not a part of that process. An exploratory interview study was conducted with 51 Italian American women who had lost their fathers, and questions about grief, culture, and belief systems were asked. An emerging view of the range of spiritual and religious beliefs and practices held by the Italian American women, and how they contributed or not to the grief process, is delineated. We discuss the meaning of this work for bereavement studies, Italian American studies, and psychology of religion and spirituality, as well as how this work might generalize to other groups and experiences of loss, including implications for therapy with people in mourning.