What is the genre of your book?

The book incorporates aspects of practical spirituality and autobiography. However, it is best described as a cultural study.

What prompted the writing of this book?

The recent loss of my paternal grandmother, Esther Palma, and maternal great-Aunt, Esther Stigliano, catalyzed a fresh resolve to revisit and write on my roots. Both were nonagenarians and represented in life a window into the world and ways of a cherished yet overlooked generation. Embracing Our Roots harkens to their legacy who, as Italian immigrants, braved the New World on behalf of subsequent kin. Inspired by their legacy, I began to mine the treasures that had been passed down to me—family records, personal letters, and photo albums, retracing the footsteps of those whose legacies I carry on.

What is the overarching message of the book?

Drawing from my background as an Italian American evangelical, Embracing Our Roots considers the significance of rediscovering our ancestral history in a society where many are forced to repress, ignore, or reject their heritage. As a nation of immigrants, every American is, in some sense, an “ethnic” American and stands to benefit from considering how the people and places they come from make them unique.

What major themes are addressed?

The book addresses the issues of biblical living, faith-based traditions, food culture, immigration, social class, race, family dynamics, and mental health.

Paul J. Palma, Embracing Our Roots: Rediscovering the Value of Faith, Family, and Tradition (Wipf and Stock, 2021).

What makes your book unique from other similar books?

Other books have been written on the significance of ancestry, ethnic background, and building our family tree. This work is unique because it situates the entire project of retracing our roots within the larger referents of biblical redemption and a faith-entranced worldview. The significance of genealogy is a reoccurring theme in the Bible, harkening to the communal, familial dimension of God’s providence.

Who do you envision as the target audience for this book?

It is intended for scholars and laypersons alike. While I claim that genealogy and family life are best approached from a faith-entranced perspective, I hope this work will also be illuminating for those looking in on the life of faith from the outside. I invite non-religionists interested in their ancestral history to join in this journey of rediscovery.

Did the circumstances surrounding the Coronavirus pandemic influence your perspective in any way?

The work was completed at the height of the COVID 19 pandemic. Amid immense loss for our families, our nation, and the world, I realized there was something that nothing and no one can take from us—the value of our inheritance. Rooted in God’s constancy, we can have confidence that our faith and family legacy will endure.

This chapter is from Paul L. King’s book Only Believe: Examining the Origins and Development of Classic and Contemporary Word of Faith Theologies.

Several years ago I read St. John of the Cross on mortification of self and at the same time read Robert Schuller on self-esteem. I learned from both, even though the writings of these two authors are poles apart. Both teach elements of truth, but both represent opposite extremes. The dynamic tension of the counter-polarities needs to be kept in balance. If self-esteem is taught without the cross, the believer’s thought and practice are skewed and become egocentric. If death to self is taught without understanding the believer’s exalted position in Christ, the believer’s thought and practice are again skewed and susceptible to self-centered spiritual flagellation. The key to healthy Christian living and faith is to hold these two truths in balance.¹ However, in relation to faith teaching, claiming the believer’s inheritance would seem to be at odds with dying to one’s self. How can the two seemingly contradictory concepts be reconciled?

In reality, healthy faith must maintain a healthy blend of both dying to self and claiming the rights and privileges of the believer. The message of the crucified life is the one element often missing from modern faith teaching and practice, thus breaking down the dynamic tension. Kenneth Hagin does not negate the cross, but believes it has been over-emphasized to the neglect of the abundant life in Christ: “The trouble with us is that we have preached a ‘cross’ religion, and we need a ‘throne’ religion. … The cross is actually a place of defeat, whereas the Resurrection is a place of triumph. When you preach the cross, you are preaching death, and you leave people in death. We died all right, but we’re raised with Christ.”² The classic faith leaders of the Keswick and Higher Life movements would agree that we need a throne religion, but not to the neglect of the cross. Without the cross life the emphasis on obtaining the promised blessings of God is out of balance and susceptible to egocentricism and distortion.

Martin Luther (1483-1546)
Via Wikimedia Commons.

Martin Luther distinguished a theology of glory (theologia gloria) from a theology of the cross (theologia crucis). The theology of glory “is concerned primarily with God and his glory, whereas the other sees God as hidden in his suffering.”³ According to Luther, man prefers the theology of glory or triumphalism because it exalts man: “He prefers works to suffering, glory to the cross, strength to weakness, wisdom to folly, and in general, good to evil.”⁴ In contrast, the emphasis of the New Testament exalts the humbling of Christ and denial of self: “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bondservant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:5-8, NASB).

A. B. Simpson (1843-1919), founder of the Christian and Missionary Alliance.
Via Wikimedia Commons.

Luther further declared, in contrast to some modern faith thought, that “God can only be found in suffering and the cross. … Therefore the friends of the cross say that the cross is good and works are evil, for through the cross works are dethroned and the old Adam, who is especially edified by works, is crucified. It is impossible for a person not to be puffed up by his good works unless he has first been deflated and destroyed by suffering and evil until he knows that he is worthless and that his works are not his but God’s.”⁵ Other mystics likewise emphasized the life of the cross. Fenelon avowed, “We are nothing without the cross.”⁶ Thomas a Kempis likewise observed centuries ago, “The Lord has many lovers of His crown but few lovers of His cross.”⁷