Malta: A land of faith and Marian wonders

The Maltese are well known for their deep Catholic faith and their centuries-old devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Maltese Christian community is as old as those of Ephesus, Jerusalem, Corinth and Rome, thanks to the Apostle Paul – which explains its 2,000 years of Christian history.

The Blessed Virgin has always had an important place in the Maltese Christian tradition. When the Apostle was shipwrecked on the archipelago’s shores, he was accompanied by Luke – the most Marian of all Evangelists. Luke is also the author of the Acts of the Apostles, and the fact that he uses the first person plural “we” when recounting the shipwreck in Acts 28 further proves that the first Mariologist was with Paul (“When we were safely ashore,” Luke writes, “we found that the island was called Malta.”) Therefore, it is likely that Luke spoke to the Maltese about the Mother of the Savior – and that they warmly received his words.

Various historical artifacts and oral traditions from the time of the Apostle’s shipwreck indicate that the natives who accepted the Good News and were baptized in Christ were devotees of the Blessed Virgin. Thus, Malta can be considered one of the earliest Marian shrines.

Soaking up the local devotion

The Marian devotion in which the local children are imbued from their earliest years is witnessed by the hundreds of churches and chapels dedicated to the Blessed Virgin: more than 200 out of a total of 359 churches in just 316 square kilometers. Many of these churches serve as Marian sanctuaries, known for granting special and miraculous graces to countless people over the centuries.

Whether due to the historical connection with St. Luke, Byzantine influences, or the enduring devotion of the Maltese people, Malta stands as a testament to a rich and enduring Marian tradition.

This will be encapsulated in the Melita Mariana Itinerary, a collaborative project between XirCammini and the Malta Tourism Authority, which will develop this Marian devotion, fused in the fiber of the Archipelago, into a 5-day, 100+km pilgrimage encompassing ancient and recent Marian devotions across Malta and Gozo.

A small chapel dedicated to Our Lady of the Snows (Madonna tas-Silġ), built on a hill overlooking the Byzantine port of Marsaxlokk, is evidence that Malta was a center of Marian devotion. For centuries, seafarers who used this port left burnt offerings to various goddesses associated with sea travel, from the Phoenician Astarte to the Carthaginian Melqart to the Roman Juno. Here we do well to remember the Church’s policy, after the Emperor Constantine declared Christianity to be the religion of the Empire, of converting pagan temples into churches dedicated to Christ and his saints. Temples dedicated to goddesses were then consecrated to the Blessed Virgin.

On the Tas-Silġ hill there was a Neolithic pagan temple dedicated to the goddess of fertility (3000 BC). The Phoenician seafarers built a temple in honor of Astarte, queen of the stars and thus of sea travel (c. 700 BC). Around 300 BC, the Romans turned the Punic temple into a shrine to their goddess Juno, queen of the sky.

Orthodox influence

Now, it is a historical fact, proven by irrefutable documentary and architectural evidence, that a special and intense devotion to the Blessed Virgin was one of the main characteristics of the Christian Orthodox Church and society. Orthodox Byzantines took with them the cult of Mary, which entered the souls of the Maltese and has never left them since.

Between the 4th and 5th centuries the Orthodox Byzantines built a basilica on the site of Tas-Silġ. It is very difficult not to conclude that it was dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. In fact, the period in which it was built, the 5th century, coincides with the Council of Ephesus, the third Ecumenical Council in 431, in which the title of Theotokos was proclaimed for the Mother of Christ.

The history of the Gozo Cathedral, dedicated to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the title by which Mary is the patron saint of the Maltese Islands, is further evidence of the millennia-old devotion to Mary in the islands. In fact, the archipelago is dotted with parishes, churches and chapels dedicated to the Assumption – Gozo Cathedral being the highest ranking church in the archipelago with this title.

There are a number of documented sources indicating that the first church on the site predates the Cathedral by centuries. It may have been dedicated to the Dormition of the Blessed Virgin Mary, from which the name Assumption was derived.

Conception, Dormition, Assumption

In both Eastern and Western Christianity, one of the oldest (if not the oldest) Marian devotions is that of the Dormition of the Blessed Virgin as a prerequisite for her imminent glorification – her Assumption into heaven. The devotional life of the Maltese Islands has always given special importance to the Assumption. In the archipelago, she is known as Santa Marija Assunta (or simply Santa Marija). Indeed, Santa Marija has always been the most popular feast and the source of widespread devotion. However, its early origins are difficult to trace. It would not be surprising if the early Christians of Gozo dedicated the Temple of Juno to the Dormition.

There are numerous forms of Marian devotion (veneration of a particular Marian title) that are widespread and retain importance in our national Christian traditions (churches, chapels, altars, paintings, images, sanctuaries and feasts).

Our Lady of Ta’Pinu

The beginnings of the devotion to the Virgin of Ta’ Pinu are so ancient that they have been lost in time. Documented records show that the church was rebuilt, which means that the chapel was there long before 1545. In 1575 the Apostolic Visitor Pietro Duzina, delegated by Pope Gregory XIII, found it in a very bad condition and ordered its demolition. When the demolition began, a workman broke his arm with the first blow, which was taken as an omen that the chapel wou