Carmelo Crisafulli

Born on on 31 August 1896, Carmelo Crisafulli was the son of Ignazio Crisafulli, head of a poor family in Enna, Sicily.

Early in his working life, he followed work opportunities to Messina. Pentecostal preaching came to this city in 1912, only four years after much of the city was destroyed through an earthquake and tsunami, through the itineration of Giacomo Lombardi [q.v.] and Serafino Arena. Lombardi had returned to Italy to evangelize very shortly after the outbreak of Holy Spirit baptisms in the Italian community in Chicago in 1907. Seven years later, Arena would found the pentecostal church in Catania.

Lombardi's visit provoked a small but influential wave of personal evangelism among those who had been baptised under his ministry. Believers, many of them uneducated, circulated to various areas of the city and to the surrounding villages, extending individual invitations. Many of those they contacted found conversion after intense experiences of prayer.

The Messina church, as was the case wherever the influence of the Assemblea Cristiana in Chicago spread, was congregational in form. Meetings were presided over by "elders", chosen among those who had borne witness or among capable local new converts. These elders -- none of them trained in ministry, and few educated beyond elementary school level -- alternated on the preaching roster, led local preaching and evangelistic outreach, and provided pastoral care and teaching.

In 1923, Crisafulli was converted in the church, and baptised in the Spirit. Shortly afterwards, Giacomo Lombardi, back from the United States, took on the leadership of the community of Messina for a few months. The recently converted Crisafulli later remembered that he 'never dared to speak with brother Giacomo Lombardi because he put me in awe of his severe and authoritative personality'. The story of what happened next has been handed down in ways which emphasised the prophetic nature of the calling. While in a worship meeting, Lombardi spoke out a "Word of Wisdom", asking if there was anyone named Carmelo Crisafulli in the meeting. Crisafulli timidly replied: "It's me"; "Well," said Lombardi, "come forward because the Lord is calling you to be the elder of this Church."... I was amazed, but I obeyed and there in front of the community he laid his hands on me and prayed for me." (Figure che Scompaiono)

Crisafulli went on to lead the community for forty-eight years. They were difficult years. He was appointed to the leadership just as the Fascist regime was gaining in power in Rome. He travelled to Rome to participate in the first two national conventions of the pentecostal movement in 1928 and 1929. In 1929, with the Lateran Pacts and subsequent enabling legislation relating to the culti ammessi, it fell to the minister of the pentecostal church in Via Adige, Rome (Ettore Strappaveccia, 1886-1957), to recognize and delegate responsibilities to local churches throughout the country. For Sicily, only two were recognized - Carmelo Crisafulli and Giovanni Sola. On the one hand, the Church was growing in number - when fascist persecution broke out under the oppressive Circolare Buffarini-Guidi (1935) the church in Messina already numbered some 400 members. (Toppi 1999) As a non-commissioned officer in the Army, however, Crisafulli was called up at the outbreak of War and transferred to East Africa. His place was taken by one of the local elders, Francesco Pellegrino (1869-1960), who took care of the community until Crisafulli returned in 1945, to be re-elected pastor (a small dissenting minority detached to found an independent community). Meanwhile, corporate meetings were suppressed by police action, and meetings were held from house to house until the fall of fascism.

A place to celebrate worship was found in Via del Tirone. In 1947 the community moved to a room located at the bottom of Viale Europa, the Lido del Sud, where it remained until 1953/54. The legal situation did not improve, however, until the voiding of Fascist legal provisions, with corporate meetings repeatedly being suppressed by police action. In 1946 Crisafulli was one of the leaders in favor of the need for a national structure and was one of five members elected to the Comitato Missionario Ricostruzione e Beneficenza (Missionary Committee for Reconstruction and Charity) formed to direct foreign aid to the churches of Sicily. In 1948, Crisafulli represented his church at the formative national congress in which the Assemblee di Dio in Italia was formed. After the withdrawal of occupying American forces, and the institution of the new Italian Constitution, the conservative forces of the Christian Democrats were heavily lobbied by Catholic authorities to repress pentecostal churches. Local police ordered the closure of the church. Crisafulli put the matter in the hands of a lawyer, 'who notoriously did not serve the interests of the community'. Fortunately, the socialist Waldensian intellectual, Giorgio Spini, was then residing in Messina, and he promoted the case to the national level. In 1952-53, the socialist MP Luigi Preti made representations about the case in the Chamber of Deputies. Preti, one of the 'secular state' champions in the new Chamber opposing the erastianism of the Christian Democrat ascendancy, made a request for a written reply:

To the Minister of the Interior. - "To find out if he does not consider the behaviour of the officials of the Messina police station to be illegitimate, who have repeatedly warned and threatened the worker Carmelo Crisafulli, an elder of the Pentecostal Church of Messina, to make him desist from holding religious meetings, and to find out if deems it necessary to immediately stop this form of persecution. (10.248). (Quoted in Esposito 2013: 112)

The Under-Secretary of State, Teodoro Bubbio (1888–1965) echoed the Interior Ministry's position that fascist era legislation was still in force, despite the freedom of religion articles in the new Italian Constitution. Bubbio replied:

The practice of the so-called Pentecostal religion is not allowed in Italy, due to their singular rites, which have proved to be harmful to the psychological and physical health of the adepts. The injunction by the Messina Police to Mr. Carmelo Crisafulli to abstain from any activity and in any form, in respect of the said cult is therefore to be considered legitimate. The Under-Secretary of State: BUBBIO.” (quoted in Esposito 2014)

Preti did not let the case drop, however, repeatedly pointing out the irrationality of the Fascist provisions and their conflict with the Constitution. In October 1953 he noted in parliament:

Finally, it is necessary to mention, however very briefly, the Pentecostal sect, a sect which is still persecuted (yes, it is persecuted) by the Ministry of the Interior, on the basis of a 1935 circular from Buffarini-Guidi, which stated that this cult religion harmed the physical and mental integrity of the race. The term "race" has now been dropped from the vocabulary for obvious reasons; yet, despite this, use has continued to be made of this old circular which, in substance, is in contrast with the Constitution. The Constitution does not admit worship practices that are contrary to morality; but the psychic and physical integrity of the race has nothing to do with vice. The excuse has been made that Pentecostals 'exalt' themselves when they participate in their religious ceremonies; but, however exalted they may be, I don't think that this exaltation can lead to such serious inconveniences as to worry the Italian State and even make it violate the Constitution! (Preti 2011, pp. 341-345)

Due to constant growth, a larger centre became necessary. In 1953 site was was identified in Via Taormina, near the Celeste. It was here that the first Sunday School was formed, and lessons held every Sunday, an hour and a half before worship. This reflected the rising activity of American and Italian returnee evangelists in Italy, which kept Messina in the centre of international attention. In 1954, Richard Scotti from the Assemblies of God in the USA led a three month 'Sunday School Squad' tour of Sicily, teaching, providing materials, and helping set up American-style Sunday Schools in Sicilian churches. In Messina, he met conationals Eugene Palma and Anthony Piraino from the AGUSA Italian Branch, who were using Messina as a launch-point for an evangelistic campaign in Reggio Calabria. It would be a connection that Crisafulli would continue for many years, crossing the straits many times to preach in churches on the opposite shore. There his founding contribution and preaching was remembered as 'always clear, brief, authoritative, and edifying. His fidelity in the ministry and his steadfastness soon made him known among the churches of Sicily and also among the few existing in the province of Reggio Calabria'. Scotti noted:

In Messina, we found the church building too small for their large congregation for fourteen months the people were without a place of worship because of strong opposition from the Catholic church and the local police. We noted these conditions but in spite of the discouragements the Squad organized five classes. May we here report that Mr. Crisafulli, the pastor, has awakened to the need of a well-organized Sunday School and has accepted the program that we presented to him. (Scotti 1952: 6)

The community, however, continued to grow in number and soon even these premises proved inadequate. Despite still being officially closed down, in 1953 the church bought land on Contrada Carrubbara, Salita Villa Contino, and (in part with the support of appeals by Roberto Bracco through the pages of the national magazine Risveglio Pentecostale), a large church was built 'for the numerous Christian population of Messina'. By the time it opened in 1959, the Buffarini Guidi instructions had been repealed. (Bracco, in Risveglio Pentecostale January 1956)

As the pastor of one of the earliest and largest churches in eastern Sicily, Crisafulli's influence was significant. Not only was he key in bringing the pentecostal testimony to the smaller towns in the province (at least five other churches were founded from the evangelistic activity of his Church: S. Agata di Militello, Spadafora, Divieto, Barcellona, and Milazzo), people from those towns also went on to become key founders of churches elsewhere in the world. It was Crisafulli, for example, who was invited to preach in Spadafora by newly converted Francesca LoSurdo. Her son Pasquale, who went on to lead Italian pentecostal churches in Sydney, Australia, described the impact as follows:

Not only did [Francesca] give the gospel to the whole township [of Spadafora], but she called the pastor Crisafulli, who had a big church in Messina, and who was the [ADI] President in Sicily. He came to our own home, and preached the gospel. My mother gave an invitation to the township. We had a two story house, a small house, downstairs was full, the stairways full, upstairs full, and outside the home... we had a piazzetta, a big space where you can fit hundreds of people - it was full of crowds... My father was called by the maresciallo, and they gave him a hard time, but my father supported my mother. (Hutchinson 1999)

Another family impacted was the Fiumara/D'Ali family, who also migrated to Australia, and became pillars of the Italian Assemblies of God in Sydney.

Esteemed within the ADI movement, Crisafulli was elected uninterruptedly as a member of the General Council of the ADI Churches from 1955 to 1971. Two years before he died, the Church in Messina experienced a significant reviving, with fifty believers of all ages experiencing the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Crisafulli died on 17 June 1972, leaving something of a leadership vacuum. It would take four years before a permanent pastoral replacement was found in the appointment of the neapolitan-born Giuseppe Melluso.

Sources:

• ADI Messina, Cenni Storici, https://www.adimessina.it/me/index.php/it/chi-siamo/cenni-storici.html.

• ADI Reggio Calabria, 'Figure che scompaiono', https://www.adi-rc.org/figure-che-scompaiono.html.

• Esposito, Salvatore, 'The Assemblies of God in Italy and the issue of religious freedom: From Buffarini Guido Guidi Ministerial Memorandum, to the Entente Law with the Government', Studying Pentecostalism in a Transcultural Perspective, Heidelberg University, 3-5 April 2014.

• Esposito, Salvatore, Un secolo di pentecostalismo italiano, (Milano: The Writer, 2013)

• Hutchinson, Mark, Pellegrini: An Italian Protestant Community in Sydney, 1958-1998. Chester Hill: AAPS, 1999.

• Preti, Luigi, A.G. Sabatini (ed.), Luigi Preti: discorsi parlamentari 1947-1987 (Rome: Camera dei Deputati, 2011).

• Scotti, Richard, 'Building Sunday Schools in Sicily', Pentecostal Evangel no. 2088 (16 May 1954): 6.

• Toppi, Francesco, Vincenzo Federico: Propugnatore della collaborazione tra le chiese evangeliche pentecostali (Roma: ADI Media, 2006)

• Toppi, Francesco, E mi sarete testimoni (Roma: ADI Media, 1999)