[attach id=260394 size="medium"]Martyrdom of St Catherine of Alexandria by Mattia Preti.[/attach]

I got to know Fr Eric Overend at the seminary. He was an extremely industrious man with whom I laboured often in the fields around the seminary – these were the days before the seminary had been turned into a concrete jungle.

I greatly mourned the loss of Fr Overend, as I lamented even more greatly the decision to cancel the feast of Saint Catherine, allegedly out of respect for him. If the Curia’s intention was to show respect for the memory of Fr Eric, it has failed miserably. For what less respect can that much loved priest have been shown than to have his memory besmirched by all this hullaballoo and used as a weapon in the Curia’s quest to disrupt popular religious practices?

Common sense dictates that a period of mourning should be far shorter. As it is, mourning for the Pope himself – the period called ‘Novemdiales’ – is nine days long, not six weeks!

On television, an official of the Curia asked why nobody made a big deal when the Qrendi feast was cancelled after a man died while manufacturing fireworks and, similarly, why there was no outcry when three years ago the Żejtun feast was again cancelled after the death of the sacristan, Ganni, who too died after suffering injuries in a firework-related incident. This official alleged that those who are now protesting the decision are somehow guilty of applying two weights and two measures.

By his allegation, this official unwittingly revealed his hand. For now it is perfectly clear that the feast was cancelled because invidious comparisons are being made between the deaths of laymen and of priests. Gone now is the rhetoric of funerary sermons reminding Christians not to mourn overmuch on such occasions because Christ has indeed risen from the dead.

It now appears that by the cancellation of the feast of Saint Catherine, the authorities want to send a clear message on the ownership of feasts. Let it not be forgotten that feasts underwent explosive growth only when parish priests lost control over them. Clerical diatribes against feasts are not really motivated by rivalry, intoxication, frisky youngsters or the number of balloons and banners held aloft in marches. The crux of the matter lies in this: who is the organiser of the festa?

By cancelling both the internal and the external festivities at Żejtun, the curia is trying to send the message that it is the boss during festa time, to the exclusion of every other society and club in the parish.

The alleged division in Żejtun between those who wanted the feast to be celebrated in its entirety, those who wanted a partial celebration of the feast and those who wanted no celebration was a godsend to those harbouring these designs.

Now, a new reason was delivered on a silver platter to cancel the feast and bring down the opprobrium of the public on the committees rather than on the curia. Divide and rule is clearly the principle at play here.