When the Saints go marching

I was brought up in an ordinary Maltese family, however feasts were never really an integral part of my upbringing. Except for the occasional visit to my parents’ town (of origin) feast, I had no communion with this occasion.

Dr Andrew Azzopardi Dean Faculty for Social Wellbeing, University of Malta & Broadcaster – Għandi xi Ngħid www.andrewazzopardi.org ll that the feast meant to me, from the perspective of a child, was that these seemed ‘important men’ (both my parents’ patron saints were men) and for this reason are paraded around the streets. I also clearly recall the Saint’s bradella facing the people, bobbing up and down on the Church parvis after travelling over the heads of its aficionados (please keep in mind my size and age at the time). I cannot remember us being too affianced with this social phenomenon. We just clapped with the innu marc and at the same time I always remember thinking what sad and unhappy faces the Saints had - considering they get all that applause!

However, undoubtedly, the festa remains one of the most significant and noteworthy communitarian events in our Country for an array of reasons being religious or other. The interesting, complex and intertwining dynamics embedded in the festa, namely, cult, culture, spirituality, art and identity are fabulous.

What the festa does is create an encounter and an opportunity to engage and to get people to come together, where they can speak, argue, laugh, celebrate, contemplate and (possibly) pray. It’s essentially a ‘community’ experience in the full sense of the word.

The findings ... suggest that participation (particularly active participation) in festi is linked with higher well-being levels among young people, even if the other determinants of well-being are controlled. The sheer extent to voluntary participation, would suggest that the effect of participation on participants is indeed likely to be causal and positive... Assessing magnitudes could be an important justification of further financial support for festi to enhance inclusion and further participation. (Briguglio, 2015, p. 77).

The feast tends to weave a sense of affiliation and affinity like no other. It has converged culture with tradition and religion, within a sense of commune. What the feast does is that it serves as a melting pot of emotions, interests and passions. The relevance and bearing of the festa is second to none. This phenomenon does not only generate economy but it also produces a whole array of positives; appreciation of village heritage, music, band marches, sense of wellbeing, reconciliatory moods, common objectives, colour, enthusiasm, appreciation of village history, spirituality and a great deal of conversation.

Naturally, this phenomenon also has its downside; excessive noise pollution, litter, fumes, traffic congestion, binge drinking, lack of accessibility amongst other.

However, even though I am not a festa enthusiast myself, I still think that the positives outweigh the negatives.

The feast is also an opportunity for social inclusion, for a level playing field, where the village lawyer and the clerk, the pharmacist and the care worker are all celebrating together, in the main amicably, and this is mesmerizing. Loyalty and engagement in a group (this time round it’s the band club) is itself a good thing, because people live in groups and the fact that one is entirely engaged in the community is of the essence.

Since the pioneering research by Jeremy Boissevain in the 1950s and sixties, the festa has been used as a lens through which to examine wider issues in Maltese society. For Boissevain, the factionalism and pika (rivalry) between different confraternities, band clubs and groups of dilettanti (festa enthusiasts) cast light on the intense political machinations of late colonial Malta. (Mitchell, 2015, xiii)

The festa also helps us to let loose social development. In a way it is a point of entry to conceptualise the quandary of our social transformations. This phenomenon converges tradition with neo-liberalism (post-EU), community with individualisation (post-technology), the local with the global, secularism with the intense religiosity (for example, statutes and devotion) and remoteness with participation (fireworks, band marches and decorations adorning the streets).

Feasts keep being replenished – and there is no end in sight, a fine thing indeed.

I think that the constant and consistent revitalisation came about following the involvement of young people in the festa. The fact that they got engaged with the festa brought about a metamorphosis. The festa has managed to survive by mixing traditions; modern music, fireworks that are synchronised to music and street parties and at the same time the traditional bands march on, the signs, symbols and emblems of Christianity are pronounced and the occasional prayer, the procession and ritual present as well.

The festa with all its positives and negatives, provides community, affords serenity whereby its ritualistic format provides calmness and security. It is a rite of integration above all else, a community bond, a vehicle to competitive rivalry but it also shapes customs.

The moment the Church distances itself from the festa esterna (the external feast) is the moment the Church would be tying a noose around its neck. Whilst not too much is spiritual in the feast, for the Church to retain its posture it needs to realise that the strongest sense of outreach lies in those two weeks preceding the feast. The more detached the Church becomes from this event, the more difficult it retains its relevance.