Among the thousands of people who every year flock to Cospicua for the procession of the Risen Christ one is likely to spot Fr Dionysius Mintoff who, 85 years ago, was “blessed” by that same statue.
Decades ago, the statue of Christ hovering majestically over a decorative solid silver tombstone would be carried shoulder-high along Cospicua streets at the crack of dawn, Fr Mintoff, a Franciscan friar, recalled.
“The Easter Sunday procession would start at about 5am. Along the streets, people would lift up babies and children and either put them for a few seconds on the statue’s pedestal or rub them against the statue of the Risen Christ to be blessed.
“I was born in Easter of 1931 and my grandma, Mananni, held me in her arms as she reached out from the window in the very narrow road so I could come in contact with the statue.
“My mother was quite proud that I had been blessed by the Risen Christ,” Fr Mintoff, the brother of the late former prime minister Dom Mintoff, told this newspaper as he sat on a bench in the area known as the Xgħajra ta’ Bormla.
Nowadays, people start gathering there at about 8.30am and some recall the traditional meeting of the Vittoriosa and Cospicua processions beneath the Vittoriosa Gate.
“For as long as I can remember, the crowds on each side of the gate used to cheer and lift the statue as high as they could,” Fr Mintoff said. Several – including Fr Mintoff himself – believe the Cospicua Easter celebrations, steeped in tradition, were the first of the sort on the island. And it was the Cospicua generations which followed and settled in the surrounding localities who took these traditions with them, including running with the statue, which actually has Sicilian origins, he noted.
The halting of the traditional ‘confrontation’ at Vittoriosa Gate has not quelled the enthusiasm and cheery atmosphere which Fr Mintoff remembers from before World War II.
The founder of the Peace Lab in Ħal Far remembers the Easter Sunday celebrations held before World War II, when figolli consisted of a piece of dough cut in the shape of a fish to represent Christ. At times, these figolli were cut in the shape of a woman, whose face would be marked with a piece of silver paper.
The figolli all came with an egg – a symbol of fertility… and they were blessed in the same way children were, by rubbing them gently against the statue.
World War II, however, wiped Cospicua of its inhabitants, who sought refuge in other localities. Fr Mintoff’s family moved to Rabat and the house where he was born on that Easter of 1931, in the area known as Ta’ Santa Liena, was bombed down.
Apart from the infrastructure, another stark difference Fr Mintoff recalls are the clothes people used to don on Easter Sunday, including the men’s kappell tar-ross.
But the Easter message remains the same – that of peace and union, he added, also referring to Pope Francis’s message this spring.
As wars raged all over the world, people needed to overcome their indifference and do their part to stop the suffering. Although they could not directly help those in Syria, they could take a look around them – at home and at work – and do their part, Fr Mintoff urged.