In Palermo, a Catholic Saint Joins the Hindu Pantheon
The New York Times
The Sicilian capital, Palermo, has a long history of cultural melding. Its new arrivals from Sri Lanka have embraced St. Rosalia.
After they spread pink petals on golden statues of Ganesh and Shiva, and recited prayers to blue-skinned and eight-armed gods, the Hindu faithful left their temple and headed to a party for another one of their divinities — the Catholic St. Rosalia.
“To the other goddess!” said Swasthika Sasiyendran, 23, after she changed from her gold-and-white sari into a T-shirt bearing Rosalia’s face.
Every year, in the height of Sicily’s summer heat, Palermo fills with festival lights and honking scooters as people gather to celebrate Rosalia, the city’s patron saint. Among the hundreds of thousands who join the procession, which culminates with a towering statue of the saint being carried through the streets, are members of the city’s Sri Lankan Tamil community, some of Rosalia’s most ardent worshipers.
Palermo is prone to this kind of medley. It is a city that sits between continents, shaped by the overlapping of Greek, Byzantine, Arab, Norman and Spanish civilizations, which hundreds of years ago made it a cosmopolitan, open and refined metropolis.
The blurring of lines between faiths, origins and traditions stands in stark contrast to a growing political discourse in Italy and Europe that insists on firm borders between nations and religions, and immutable identities.
