ERAMS CHURCH(BELL) - LOCAL APPROPRIATIONS OF CATHOLICISM ON ETTAL

After the Catholic missionary Father Martin Espinal arrived on the Mic ronesian island of Ettal in 1924, the Catholic religion began to take root there, although not without some initial difficulty. To understan d why Ettal Islanders began to convert to Catholicism and why Catholic ism was at first resisted, it is necessary to know the history not of Father Espinal but of a man called Eram. Eram brought the Catholic Chu rch to Ettal. Eram's story is not ecclesiastical history and it is not known through documents and written records. It is a story told and r etold by Eram's descendants on Ettal. It belongs to them, and only the y can give it, on their terms. Eram's history challenges conventional notions of religious conversion and Islander history, and until Eram's story and others like it are recognized and appreciated, vital elemen ts of Islanders' histories will remain incomprehensible.