Before I met Alfredo Del Rosso, I had formed a mental picture of him that was completely wrong. We had been appointed as missionaries to Italy in February of 1974. During my last weekend at my parents' home before leaving for Italy, I devoted a morning to browsing the library at what is now Southern Nazarene University. I browsed through back issues of Other Sheep, a monthly world missions magazine once published by the Church of the Nazarene. I was reading anything and everything I could find about the work of the Church of the Nazarene in Italy.
I found quite a bit of material written by Alfredo Del Rosso. Then, in an old bound volume from 1948, I came across an interview with Del Rosso that included his picture. The photograph was only a headshot, so I let my imagination supply the rest. I imagined him to be tall and physically imposing. So, you can imagine my shock when I first met Alfredo Del Rosso at a pastors' meeting in Rome just after we arrived in Italy as Nazarene missionaries. There, in the small sanctuary of our Rome church, I found myself looking down at Alfredo Del Rosso —and I'm only 5 feet 7 inches tall myself!
After recovering from the shock of how much my mental picture differed from reality, I discovered that Alfredo Del Rosso was an impressive person, regardless of his physical stature. For decades, he had been driven by a single-minded commitment to proclaiming the message of second-blessing holiness. In fact, one of my most vivid memories of him is an incident on the front steps of our half-basement chapel in Rome. Barbara and I were still struggling through language school, and Del Rosso had come to Rome for a special service. Afterward, we stood out front talking. I heard him saying,
"Holiness makes sense to Italian ways of thinking. All his life, the Italian has searched for release from sin, for a feeling of purity within. The biblical doctrine of entire sanctification is exactly what he's been looking for all along."
My decision to write this fascinating man's life story grew partly out of a desire to reconcile two conflicting assessments of his life and ministry that I kept hearing. Alfredo Del Rosso wasn't someone either Italian or American colleagues could ignore. He also lived in an era when ethnocentrism and cultural insensitivity sometimes went unrecognized among church leaders. Because Alfredo Del Rosso had a strong personality, he was either revered or scorned. So my curiosity about who this man really was led me to research his life extensively. It turned out to be a delightful study.
Although Alfredo Del Rosso was no superhuman, he was a man captivated by the dream of participating in a flourishing holiness movement in Italy. As Nazarene missiologist Paul Orjala pointed out, Del Rosso was one of the few independent ministry leaders in a world mission area who brought a group of congregations into the Church of the Nazarene and remained a loyal member of the denomination. Most independent leaders who merged their ministries into the denomination found it difficult to give up the top position and serve within the hierarchy of a larger organization. His significance in Nazarene church history is reflected in his inclusion by name in the brief official denominational history at the beginning of some editions of the Nazarene Manual.
I need to thank a host of people on both sides of the Atlantic who let me read letters, recounted stories to me, and scoured their memories and files to provide necessary bits of insight and information. I'll refrain from listing these dear people— American, Italian, and Swiss—who patiently answered my questions and told me what they knew about Alfredo Del Rosso. Such a list would be long, and I would still likely forget someone. Special thanks go to Nazarene General Superintendent Edward Lawlor, who, at the outset of this project, insisted that I follow through on it. I'm also indebted to my wife and our two children, who allowed me to spend most of one vacation pulling together my notes into the first drafts of this manuscript. . . . Continue to chapter 2
| Being sent to that Protestant private school startled Alfredo. He had always thought of himself as a Catholic. So, he asked his mother why he was being sent to the Protestant school. "It's cheaper, son," she replied simply. . . . Continue to chapter 2 |
—Howard Culbertson, hculbert@snu.edu
Note: Material for this biography was gathered in Italy in the late 1970s from letters, books, magazine articles, and interviews with many of the principal characters, including several missionaries to Italy, Alfredo Del Rosso himself (1890–1985), and members of his family. Most of those interviewed for this biography have since died.
Printed resources include In Their Steps by D. I. Vanderpool (Beacon Hill Press, 1956) and They of Italy Salute You by Earl Morgan (Nazarene Publishing House, 1958).
The manuscript of this book is in the Wesleyan Holiness Digital Library.
Complete book in PDF format: Del Rosso's biography in English Del Rosso's biography in Italian
