Every Italian mother thinks her son is special. I am sure non-Italians feel the same way, but I can really only opine on personal experience.

My grandmother had one son, and he was her prince. Louie was a great guy, and in Philly’s 49th Street neighborhood, where bad boys weren’t really all that bad and good boys were simply aspiring bad boys, Louie Fusco was pretty typical. Handsome, a bit rough around the edges, not particularly ambitious, and an eye for the pretty girls. He ended up with a very pretty one, my Aunt Connie, a woman who was not Italian and therefore did not quite understand the connection between her husband and his mother.

Before settling down, he did a tour with the Marines and was stationed in Beirut, and for the rest of his life sported the most magnificent rope-and-anchor tattoo on his forearm. That made him pretty legendary for me, his favorite niece. When she died, she took a piece of his heart with her. But it’s better that she went first, because losing him would have taken all of hers.

My mother, Lucy, had three sons, and they were also her pride and joy. My sister and I knew she adored us, except when she was annoyed with me over my room or my hair or my….hair.

But her boys were special. Teddy, Jon and Michael. It’s hard to explain the bond she shared with each of them separately, but suffice it to say when she told me I had to make their beds (even though they were entirely capable of doing it themselves) this was in no way a punishment for me. It was her tribute to them, her precious little princes.

Italian mothers are that way. At least Italian mothers of a certain vintage. It is possible the younger women who have vowels at the ends of their names will be raising their sons to embrace feminist principles, but not the ladies who graduated from West Catholic in 1956, or before. That was love, mixed with an almost possessory intent. This is what I meant when I said that my non-Italian Aunt Connie never quite got the zeitgeist.

When my brother Jon died before my mother, her entire heart was lost with him. That’s not to say that she didn’t live for the survivors, and that she wasn’t here for us. She was, because like all Italian mothers, she had the strength and endurance of the Spartans. But for Lucy, losing one child was like losing them all, and her grief lasted until she herself was reunited with him and my father, in heaven.

I was thinking of my grandmother and my mother, and all of the other “madri italiane” this weekend, when Carlo Acutis was canonized. Acutis, now a saint, died at the age of 15 almost twenty years ago from a fast moving Leukemia. During his short lifetime, he became a passionate evangelizer for the Catholic faith, and embraced a love for God and a devotion for Mary that are uncommon among the young, although not quite as uncommon as you might think. It seems that even though he was a saintly child on earth, he was also very much a normal child, someone who loved video games and hiking and being with his parents.

His mother was at his canonization, which has happened only one other time in the history of the church. I saw a closeup of her at St. Peter’s, watching as her baby boy was inducted into the pantheon of saints. She was, of course, incredibly moved. But there was something that I noted that reminded me that she was, in fact, like all of the other Italian mothers that I have known in my lifetime. At one point, she tilted her head, nodded in a knowing way. It was almost a cross between a smirk and a beatific smile. I have seen that look millions of times in my own life, and it usually means “well of course, you thought my child wasn’t perfect? Of course he is.” It was a non-verbal “I told you so.” And it was probably the most moving part of the ceremony, for me.

Here is a mama whose child is now part of the angelic chorus, this fruit of her own womb, and the pain that she suffered in losing him at such a tender age is still embedded in her mother’s heart. But for a moment on a brilliant September morning, in the presence of the world, she was able to brag about her special boy.

And all the Italian mothers understood.

Copyright 2025 Christine Flowers