The tremendous effect of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio’s Beheading of St John on the visitor on entering the Oratory is one of overwhelming awe and marvel. This masterpiece is still in situ, in the place for which it was painted by the artist, above the Altar of the Decollation in the Oratory of the Conventual Church (St John’s Co-Cathedral).

Well, apparently, all this is set to change, as the St John’s Co Cathedral Foundation (which is responsible for administering the Church and museum in order to ensure its effective conservation and management as a historic and architectural monument) is planning to move this masterpiece from its original site to what has been called a ‘Caravaggio Centre’.

When Caravaggio began his one-year novitiate in July 1607, the Oratory was still a plain rectangular construction with a flat roof and a shallow depression on its east end, flanked by two massive Doric piers.

Caravaggio’s famous masterpiece was most probably painted on the spot and destined by the artist to hang on that East wall, made to measure for the site by the artist who would have taken cognisance of the natural light streaming in through the six windows which overlook the cemetery.

We have the privilege of having a world-renowned masterpiece still hanging in the place where it was intended – this in itself is probably a rarity – and the idea of shifting it elsewhere is so wrong that it beggars belief.

Caravaggio lived for only 15 months in Malta where his activity is unfortunately very scantily recorded.

The libraries have so far yielded only five documents directly concerning the artist, one from the registers of the Inquisition Tribunal and the other four from the archives of the knights.

What, besides the five documents, and the proposed “projections, feature films, connections to tablets and other modern mediums”, will be contained in the Caravaggio Centre?

Five documents as artefacts can hardly make the centre worthwhile, irrespective of the technology applications to be provided. Is the cathedral therefore to be further despoiled of its heritage and specifically the two paintings by Caravaggio – the Beheading of St John and the portrait of St Jerome – in order to create another cash point?

Any amount of subtle profit-making can never justify tampering with our cultural heritage.