Photo: Chris Sant Fournier

The hot season is almost over but the heat of the festa fever lingers, with predictions swirling about the fate the Maltese festas face. The media may have started the ball rolling, with readers not familiar with village celebrations venting their limited knowledge, often interweaved with their personal dislikes.

On the other side of the coin, a different image is being depicted of the young generation as treasuring the island’s religious beliefs and traditions.

With the joyful pealing of bells now fading away for this season, mournful chimes will soon start to be heard, echoing the sombre atmosphere of November and summoning the faithful (who hold the Maltese festa at heart).

The younger generation dominates the outdoor celebrations of the Maltese festa. Youths from different strata take to the streets and express their jovial mood during the week-long festivities, joining a multicoloured parade of merrymaking complete with brass band and fireworks.

Discordant notes, however, are sometimes louder than the strains of the band music itself, when individuals and groups engage in shouting unholy slogans and impromptu ‘poetry’ addressed at the ‘other side’.

I carried out an unofficial, impromptu survey throughout summer among young people and, to my questions, only a small percentage showed any interest in attending church functions during festa week.

Ironically, some of these young men spend most of their leisure time in workshops preparing decorations and other objects d’art and another batch congregates at fireworks factories.

What keeps young parishioners away from the church itself?

Solemn vespers may top the list. Congregations are tied to their benches listening to Latin verse without understanding a word. Compensating for this are the melodious compositions by well-known maestri di cappella, the like of Nani, Bugeja, Diacono and Camilleri. But surely there needs to be some animation, such as by issuing a printout of the vespers written in both Latin and Maltese and a priest or lector explaining the proceedings.

Another function, which admittedly attracts a sizeable congregation but puts off the younger members, is the traditional homilies praising the saint’s virtues, often taking a full hour and even more.

The panegyric, in a full morning function celebrating High Mass in the summer heat, may have been an attraction in the past when outdoor festivities were coordinated with liturgical functions. Through the years, however, external events have come to overlap with indoor occurrences and tend to draw the crowds – the village band is an obvious choice for the young .

Only a small percentage of young people showed any interest in attending church functions during festa week

The outdoor festivities are the great attraction, especially for the younger folk, and the Church may be losing its hold on the faithful during religious celebrations, casting doubts over the future of the Maltese festa.

Although some may argue that centuries-old traditions cannot fade away, others have good reason to predict that the external and more attractive facets of the festa may, one day, take over completely, leaving functions held in church as token activities.

On the other hand, such prognostics have proven wrong in the past. One of them came from the distinguished anthropologist, author and researcher of Mediterranean societies, Jeremy Boissevain, who lived in Malta in the early 1960s and observed religion and politics in rural communities.

The prevailing communal atmosphere prompted him to write his thesis Saints and Fireworks – Religion and Politics in rural Malta, published by the University of London in 1968.

Boissevain admitted later he made many predictions that had turned out to be wrong. He had observed that social changes taking place in the village cores, with outsiders moving in and locals moving out, were a setback to the village festa and its gradual extinction seemed more or less inevitable. But his misfired prediction still has not materialised.

He admitted recently he was not correct when he had stated that patronage would decline over the years “when the saints go marching out!” Outsiders and foreign residents keep ‘marching in’ and the village festa is still alive.

If anything, newly-married couples who prefer to move out of the village find the festa a good reason why to return to their native surroundings.

Such homecomings occur a lot during Christmas and on festa Sundays when reunions complemented by family lunches and family parties take place.

Certainly, the passage of time has introduced habits not entirely to my (excuse the pun) taste: there is nowadays more junk food on sale than ħobż biż-żejt and pastizzi.

Another import consists of the display of small foreign flags with barely any Maltese colours in sight.

Worse still, toy guns and other weapons are openly offered for sale in stalls to add to children’s collections.

The few days of the village festa provide a much-needed social and cultural injection to the community but the profane and commercial may be outweighing the religious significance. The church parvis may be crowded but its aisles less so.

Blame it on the Knights! According to historian P.P. Castagna, in the dwindling years of the Order in Malta, when popular support was needed, Grand Master Emmanuel De Rohan encouraged the population to celebrate parish festivities with greater pomp.

In pondering the future of the traditional festa, one must also bear in mind the festivals introduced quite recently into towns and villages. I have in mind Birgufest, Żejt iż-Żejtun, Maritime Senglea, Casal Fornaio and so many others in both Malta and Gozo, which are indirectly taking over from the annual festa celebrations. For residents who, in the not too-distant past , awaited in earnest for the annual opportunity to dress their village up in festive mood, these festivals, complete with street decorations and bands, offer a new outlet of celebration. Still, the Maltese festa has survived through the ages, notwithstanding a full calendar of events that adds new social and cultural activities with a festive theme.

My conclusion is that as long as the young generation continues to keep the festa at heart and has the vigour to organise activities, these manifestations will remain and predictions about their demise will again be proven premature.

Charles Coleiro is the author of Il-Festi Tagħna and a member of the National Festivities Committee.