The origins of confraternities hark back to the Middle Ages when men professing the same profession – like, for example, carpenters, shoemakers and doctors – joined together to safeguard their profession/s and, simultaneously, live a better spiritual life and extend help to each other in temporal and spiritual matters. Later on, the Catholic Church assigned a patron saint to each group, for example, St Joseph for carpenters.

In Malta, the process worked out in the opposite direction: the erection of confraternities was followed by their association with particular professions.

Portrait of Pope Gregory XIII (1572-85), who sent Dusina to Malta as Apostolic Visitor. Photo: Wikipedia.com

The first Maltese documentation of a confraternity refers to the Annunciation of the Virgin at Vittoriosa in 1445. Over time, the number of confraternities in Malta increased and, in 1675, Bishop Lorenzo d’Astiria (1670-8) decreed that each parish was to have a Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament. The bishop was actually simply repeating what had been carried out exactly a century previously by Mgr Pietro Dusina.

Who was Dusina and why was he sent to Malta? Hardly anything is known about him personally except that he hailed from the Italian city of Brescia.

He arrived in Malta in August 1574 after being sent by Rome’s Holy See as Inquisitor of Malta and also as Rome’s Apostolic Visitor. In fact, to carry out his mission, Dusina had to visit every local parish and church in Malta and Gozo, including those known as chapels, so that a report could be sent to Rome detailing the situation in Malta vis-à-vis the ecclesiastical, social and economic aspects of the islands. It is within this important report that there is information regarding the erection of the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament in Qormi and, indeed, in every other parish.

Dusina’s report does not paint a pretty picture of the state of the local Church

The beginning of the Dusina report extant at the Vatican. Photo: G. Aquilina/S. Fiorini

Apart from its social and economic aspects, the report does not paint a pretty picture of the state of the local Church: most of the Maltese clergy had no knowledge of the existence and the meaning of the profession of faith; baptism was still being carried out by immersion (the formola gallicana); and the Roman mass had only been introduced three years previously even though the Council of Trent had ordered its introduction in 1560 to replace the gallican mass.

Malta lacked a seminary for the formation of the clergy and most local priests did not understand Latin and were almost illiterate. The same applied to the local nuns.

Skirting aside the troubles between the grand master and the local bishop (another reason for Dusina’s presence in Malta), one must bear in mind that the first years of the 16th century had witnessed the birth of the Reformation (Protestantism) in Europe. It was followed by the Catholic Counter-Reformation, mainly through the Council of Trent which, ending in 1563, brought about a religious renewal in the Catholic Church. But this renewal, except for minor details such as the introduction of parish registers, was not apparent in Malta. Dusina was determined to introduce reforms and his visit was the signal for the real beginning of the Catholic Counter-Reformation in Malta.

Dusina’s visit to Qormi took place on Saturday, February 5, and was concluded the following Monday, February 7. He first visited the parish church of St George (not the present building), which came in for criticism: the need for a new tabernacle, a new pyx, a subpedale for the main altar, a large silver spoon for baptisms and a sacristy; church vestments were stored in private houses; and the two existing side altars lacked dedications and liturgical necessities.

Dusina’s coat-of-arms as painted at the Inquisitor’s Palace, Vittoriosa. Photo: Heritage Malta

However, what interests us here is the fact that, on his first day, Dusina carried out what he had already done in his visits to other parishes: he instituted in the parish of St George a confraternity dedicated to the Blessed Sacrament with the aim of transporting the Blessed Sacrament to sick people in their homes, and that confrères had the right to be buried wearing the confraternity’s habit: in dicta ecclesia parrochiali erexit Confraternitatem pro associando Corpus Christi ad infirmos, et sepelliendo mortuos cum sacchis coloris albi.

Dusina also wrote down the names of the first confraternity members, 15 in all, and the first officials: Julian Borg (Julianus Bogege), Thomas Calleja (Thomas Gallesius), Pascal Schembri (Pasqualis Schembre), George Pace (Georgius Pace), Sebastian Puglieso (Bastianus Pigliesus), Anthony Camilleri (Antonius Camillerius), Luke Camilleri (Lucas Camillerius), Leonard Delia (Nardus de Lia), George Schembri (Georgius Schembre), John Paul Zahra (Joannes Paulus Zara), Joseph Grech (Ioseph Grecos), Brandan Schembri (Brandanus Schembre), James Felice (Jacobus Felice), Mark Grima (Marcus Grima) and George Tabone (Georgius Tabone). The first rectors were Julian Borg and Anthony Camilleri.

When the deplorable state of the Church in Malta in 1575, coupled with the immediate need for religious and administrative reforms, is placed in its proper perspective, one can safely conclude that the erection of the Confraternities of the Blessed Sacrament in Malta and Gozo was part of Dusina’s plan to ensure that the much-needed renewal would come about.