5th February 2021: Due to the pandemic crisis, the relics of the patron Saint of Catania (Sicily/Italy), saint Agatha, do not leave the Cathedral this year. In a tense atmosphere, the voices of a few hundred devotees – many of them socially shaken off young people from the city’s numerous social flashpoints – echo in the dark night sky. Only small groups are allowed to enter piazza Duomo at a time. Each group has only a couple of minutes for the traditional prayers, then the police intervenes, scares the prayers away. 

In the Absence of the Saint. © Lene Faust

Longing for Devotion. © Lene Faust

Dr Lene Faust is a Research Fellow in Social Anthropology at the University of Bern, where she works on the ‘Religious Rituals as Coping Strategies for Conflicts’ project in the framework of the Interfaculty Research Cooperation (IRC) ‘Religious Conflicts and Coping Strategies’.