True, very true.
True story-my grandparents,now dead, were both born in 1919. Both had made comments over their lives that their parents would have been angry had they married an Italian, as Italians were the considered low in society (we had no blacks, Hispanics,etc).
The pereception of Italians, largely a result of Protestant fears/bigotry and AMericanism, ranked Italians as:
-low class
-thieves
-hot blood and could not control themselves
So, though both grandparents cradle Catholics, they and others were largely influenced to look down on their fellow white, European Catholics.......same to a degree for Slavic Catholics,etc.
How far does one take the purity thing?
No caveats.......
As noted earlier, I as a mostly white male (maybe fully, if family lore about an indian G-mother was false) generally am freinds with my own kind. I find white women the most appealing, followed, normally by Hispanics and/or asians. I have no close friends that are non-white. The wife is fully white....neighborhood we are in now, white (prior, a mix)...
But there is no Church law on outright band on inter-racial marriage......and many areas of world where the faith was spread that was far more marmonious with mixes of people.
Think of the Church 2nd century, in Africa-where whites, berbers, blacks,etc all mixed.....should not there have been some proof if problems? any writings by Mark or Athanasius,etc exhorting to stop mixing? No.....
We have a couple in parish, married now for 30 yrs, he is mainly black racially and from Puerto Rico. She a white, pale blond....2 children. He works a lot of Hispanics in church and unlike most, they are more active and participatory, though still not as much in the $$ department. Kids are adult, both clean cut, industrious-daughter is very pretty.
Shold they have been banend from sacramental marriage? are they now in sin?
No, despite societal prejudices, they thrived. We are all prejudices, I for one in my generation am not used to seeing mixed races together........sticks out and not always comfortable....often does not work out, again, due to society.......but, is it sinful? wrong? condemned? No......and again, in some areas of Europe and esp, the Americas, normal.....what unites? mystically?