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Sephardim Hope
International was founded by Grace Fenn in June, 2003 and is located
in San Martin, CA.
Sephardim Hope
International is a benevolent international non-profit
educational organization to bring the message of the
hidden Sephardic Jews (known as B'nai
Anusim) from Spain to the awareness of the world. A
message of hope to those who have felt lost and are discovering
their true heritage for the first time.
SHI is also a
support to the nation of Israel working in partnership with
other organizations bringing aid and comfort to the people of Eretz
Israel.
Through our
commitment, experience, and expertise Sephardim Hope International
has established a relationship with our partners that will last
a lifetime!
Email Sephardim Hope International
today!
Sephardim Hope
Renewed
(A Journey of Hope to the
Negev)
A shortstory autobiography by Grace
Serrano Fenn
Forward
(Sephardim Hope
Renewed)
The following is an
excerpt from a family historical account as seen through the eyes of
a Sephardi Anusim (forced one) who did not discover the true roots
of her family until her father, at the age of 87, expressed this
long hidden secret. It
is a typical account of many Sephardic Anusim families who are now
discovering their true identity as Jews. This account, a combination
of oral history and factual documentational records, in no form is
meant to either offend or discredit others perspectives on this
subject. The truth,
after all, is often a pain staking revelation that must be unfolded
on a personal basis.
The following is neither meant to offend any
official religion or persons.
Forgiveness is a cleansing thing that gives the person giving
and receiving it a freedom from the bondage of the past. This again is often a
painful process, for one must be willing to go through some pain to
receive it. The truth
is often hard to face in its rawest form. It is the prayer of this
writer, that the following will bring some measure of hope and
understanding of the past.
This Anusim history and personal account cannot be altered,
as it would be as impossible for a holocaust victim to apologize for
what they have been subjected to. However, this writing
is meant as the beginning of a healing process---a return of lost
identity and freedom from past secrets done in the name of often
mistaken religious fervor.
This account, as painful as it is to share, is done in the
spirit of hope and love.
“Love”, in this writer’s opinion, as stated in the Torah,
“covers all sins”(Prov. 10:12b). It is the highest hope that
this story, as thousands of other’s similar to it, will continue to
bring hope to those who have felt the same wandering spirit and loss
of identity as this author has experienced. It is that hope that truth
will reveal and heal, what 500 years of hidden history have tried to
erase.
“May those who sow in tears, reap with shouts
of joy”
Psalm 12a:5
Uncovering the lost
Root
It was a rainy day on
Masada and we had just walked among the ruins in February of
1999. We had just
walked in to a little restaurant stop for refreshment. As I neared the counter a
middle-aged woman greeted me warmly with a knowing look. “Why you look just like my
mother!” she said as she reached out and caressed my cheek. “My family went to Italy
from Spain, where did your family go?” Not to appear too shocked I
said, “Well, Mexico…”
It was that experience of feeling like I had “come
home” in Israel and many other questions that led me to visit my
father, Jose Muro Serrano in Texas the spring of February 2001.
It was something that I had
already suspected for many years, the biblical names given to us,
the way we were brought up, loving God and the Bible, yet not
Catholic. We never understood that this was the result of
being hidden “Anusim”, meaning that we are descendants of the
victims that were “coerced, forced or raped” from knowing who
they really were----hidden Jews to becoming “conversos”(converted
Catholic ones) in Spain, Mexico and other
places.
From Spain to
Mexico
During the beginning of
the war between Spain and France, in the late 1800’s, many of the
Spanish Sephardim families fled to Mexico and to the other South
American countries to find shelter from the arising persecution in
Spain. My father’s
story was part of these families fleeing persecution. His parents, Pantaleon (view of
the Lion) Serrano, (jornalero) laborer, carpenter and
lumberjack and his
wife, Felicitas Muro had come with about 200, a group of Sephardim
from Andalucia, Spain into Mexico in the late 1800’s with six of
their 10 children.
Our great grandparents
were Miguel and Filomena Cortes and Nazario and Isidra Llamas from the
Andalucia area of Spain. Our
family is related to Francisco Serrano y Dominguez and his nephew,
Jose Muro Lopez, historical figures of Spain. Jose Muro
Lopez was a minister of state in
1873.
Francisco Serrano, Duque (Duke) de la
Torre, was a famous Spanish Captain General of Cuba between
1859-1862. He also was Prime Minister and President of Spain
between monarchs in 1874. He died in Madrid on the 26th
of November, 1885, 24 hours after King Alphonso XII past
away.
It was, I believe, his influence with
Queen Isabella la Infanta and her mother, Christina, regent, that
contributed to the release of our family clan from Spain. This
colloberates my father's recollection of the "persecution" his
family suffered. According to the Illustrated Atlas of Jewish
Civilization Spain held little political freedom to Spanish Jews
until after 1919.
Grandfather Pantaleon, had brought his six children,
Jacinto, Lola, Fermin, Antonio, Raphael, Guadalupe and landed on the
coast of Mexico. They first
settled in Teul (north of Zacatecas). After this
grandfather hired burrows with baskets to carry the six young
children to their new home in Tesistan/Zapopan. Later on
came Manuela, Felipe, Jose (my Dad) was the 9th and
Carmen. After him came
two little twins who died at birth for a total 13
children.
Dad, Jose Muro Serrano, was born and bred on the Los
Laureles Ranch in Tesistan (Guadarajara, Jalisco), Mexico,
March 26, 1914 to
Pantaleon (vista of the lion) and Felicitas Muro. Tesistan, next to in
Sapopan, is just outside of Guadalajara, Mexico. Although dad would
tell endless stories about his youthful experiences--- the land and
his ranch (“La Pinita”), the horses, the cattle, even about
grandfather’s gold, the provincial life----he had kept a hidden
secret for eighty-seven years.
I had heard the story of my father being
ex-communicated from the predominant church in Mexico for having a
Bible and reading scriptures when it was not allowed. All
masses were held in Latin at that time and up until the 60’s no one
was encouraged to have or read the Bible. Dad had been called
in by the parish Priest because the priest had heard of him leaving
“his faith”. Dad had explained his desire for
reading the scriptures, as his family had been doing this for
generations with their Bible brought from Spain. The oldest
would recite the “prayers” and later the girls in the family would
read from the Old Testament for their nightly
“devotions”.
Grandfather had never become a Catholic and our
father, no longer wanting to worship with icons and sculptures of
saints, had tried to leave the church. The priest was
very understanding. However, another person in the parish,
having heard the conversation, his aunt or sister, approached my
father, slapped him on the face and pronounced in no uncertain terms
what a “disgrace he was to his family…” .
We had heard the story of how that evening a
posse was sent, upon this person’s influence, with torches and
horses to seek out my parents with their young baby, Rahab. We were
told how God had miraculously protected them through grandmother
hiding them and about the “baby who never cried” all night giving
away their place of safety. My grandmother had then put them
on the milk truck at 3am in the morning so they could escape to the
larger city of Guadalajara. We had been told these stories,
but never had known the “whole truth” about who we really were or
what would have led my father to such actions.
Growing up, the family was strictly forbidden to have a cross in our home,
let alone around our neck, or even a picture that would resemble any
“saint” or idol…
Dad’s family were secret Jews that had lost much of
their knowledge of who they were, but they still believed in “one
God” and dad hated the “idols” or statues of “saints”.
This was very painful for him and consequently, our father left his
family. He lost his inheritance of land, horses, cattle and
money. The family was torn apart and he no longer used the
Serrano name for many years. We were named “Muro”, after his
mother until I was almost 18 years old. It was a promise he
had made to continue her name before her death.
Mother, Francisca Garcia Marquez, on the other hand,
was raised in the Tampico/Madero area. Her family had come
from Vera Cruz. At the early age of two years, mom’ mother, Rosalie
Garcia, had given mom to her aunt, Guadalupe Marquez to raise in
Tampico/Madero. The port city of Tampico was an area to which
we would return many summers from Brownsville, Texas (on the tip of
Texas and another important port city of entry both to Mexico and
the US).
The port of Tampico became a very important port of
entry to the Sephardim fleeing Spain. The entry at Vera Cruz had
become too dangerous and housed the prison, San Juan De Ulua, to
stop and imprison many of the “prohibited people” during the
resurrection of the inquisition in the 1550’s in Mexico. This prison still stands as
a monument of horror to this day.
A Change in the
Destiny
It was in the early 1940’s, and World War II had left
a shortage of men in the United States and the Bracero Act was
passed in Texas. This
law allowed immigrant workers to travel for work purposes into the
country to fill this need.
Dad had come with many other men seeking a better life and
ended up working in New York on the Railroad as a cook. He remained there for
several years until after the war.
When the war ended, he sent for my mother, Francisca
and three children who were with her in Mexico, Rahab, Nathanael,
and Joshua (Josue). Mom, 10 years younger than dad, had
married him by an arranged marriage. Dad was a widower who
needed help with his two daughters, Ofelia and Elodia, from his
deceased wife. These girls were partially raised with
us.
By the time I came along, the six children were
complete – Rahab, the eldest, so named because it was pronounced
upon her birth, “one day she would save her people” (prophetic
significance of Rahab who had saved the Hebrew spies in
Jericho*). Her name
significance was never completely understood until many years
later. (*Joshua
2:1-21)
After Rahab, the eldest, had come Nathanael (now
deceased through a tragic murder), Joshua, and later, in the United
States, Elohim (who prefers to call himself “Joe”), Rachel and
myself.
On August 29, 1953 I was born in Brownsville, the
youngest of 6 at Brownsville’s Mercy Hospital. Although all the other
children had more biblical names, I was named, Graciela ---the Grace
of God. I was being
brought up in a Christian home and yet my father’s brokenness and
shame kept him from revealing much of our true
past.
It was strange growing up in the culture of south
Texas. The Rio Grande
Valley, where Brownsville is located on the southernmost tip of
Texas, is filled with many Hispanic “Tejanos” (the Sephardim Anusim
who migrated there in the “tragic square"). Other family members,
like my mother’s sister settled as far north as San Antonio.
Brownsville was encumbered with much prejudice and
poverty. We were raised in a "barrio" until I was 11 years
old. It was difficult, however, understanding why my family was so
different from many of the other immigrants around us. Most of
them were still Catholic with all the cultural trappings
that encompass such, with the rituals of christenings,
“quinceaneras”(girls coming out parties at 15 years of age),
etc. We had none of that influence growing
up.
Yet it was a heritage, a love for God that was
imparted to us in spite of the brokenness. I have always somehow
carried such an insatiable love for God and Israel and it is I’m
sure, partially because of my father’s love for God and God’s word
as taught first by his Jewish/converso
mother.
This
journey of my father and the secrecy that followed led the family to
a “religiously harsh” life and loss of identity. We were
nobodies without a past! Years of loving God, coupled
with confusion, a legalistic religion and ignorance about our past
as a family led me on a search that continues to this
day.
This journey has brought insight into what
we had suspected all along in my family history. Why was there so much
secrecy? Why were we
not raised Catholic? Why was dad so careful not to share too much
about his family? Why
were we called “Marranos”, “pigs” in our neighborhood? There were many things we
did not understand!
Back to the Land
It was not until November 2000 that I again had the
opportunity to visit Israel.
This time I went on my own to explore Jerusalem, on a
humanitarian visit to help with the needs of Jewish immigrants.
Because of our love for Israel I had gathered items to
take. I had taken
baby items from my little granddaughter, Audrey, to share with those
in need. What a joy to find out the next day the little diaper bag
filled with newborn items was given to a young Russian immigrant
mom! She was just going
to the hospital to deliver and cried when she received it. She could not believe that
everything she needed for her little newborn was so neatly given to
her from America.
It was during this time of learning, exploration and
prayer over the city that I came face to face literally, with people
who looked so much like me and would continually speak Hebrew to
me. I truly felt like I
had returned home for the first time in my
life.
I went to bless the land and its people. There was much my Abba had
to show me. It
was during this time that the land seemed so familiar and I truly
felt at home. God was
revealing himself to me in the land and healing my
past.
One day, as I was standing waiting for a friend
outside the tunnel tour, a large family of sephardic Jews visiting
the land exited the tunnel. I was so amazed at how much they
looked like me----I was so embarrassed to even speak to them---as
they chatted in Hebrew to each other. It was strange seeing my
nose duplicated by so many people!! It was like looking in a
mirror of long lost relatives! I felt confirmation in my
spirit now about who I was, it would soon be time to talk to my
father.
I would hide all these things in my heart but
it was not time to confront my father as yet. There was
a change of heart that God was bringing and a burden for the
land.
Revealing the
Family Roots
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