Family heritage

While talking about the heritage of white ethnic Americans in class it got me to thinking about my ethnic heritage. I’m 75% Irish and my sister is 100% Irish so when we describe ourselves we usually just refer to ourselves as Irish. But besides pale skin a love of potatoes there is little about us that really reflects our heritage. I think honestly the only thing that is traditionally Irish about is being raised somewhat Irish Catholic. My grandmother on my mothers side was very religious so she raised my mother and my aunts and uncles to be Catholic as well. And in turn due to pressure from my Grandmother all of my cousins have been raised Catholic as well, getting baptized, having their first communion and in some cases getting confirmed. Though since my Grandmothers death my family has moved away from being more traditionally Catholic, very few of my relatives in my generation, or the generation of my mother go to church, say grace before dinner or fallow through with religious rites of passage like confirmation. In fact now that there is no more pressure on my cousins or I, I don’t think that any of us have been confirmed at all. I no longer have any living relatives that have come from Ireland so there aren’t any more direct stories from the “home country”. I think it will be interesting to see how future generations of my family see themselves. Will their Irish heritage be an afterthought, or will the try to connect to the families past?