Young men carry on their shoulders the statues of the Saints of the Franciscan Order and take these from the Church of St Andrew in procession through the village roads as people duck underneath the statues. The statues then remain in the Church for three days and people continue to visit the Church and pray at the feet of the saints. Today the Franciscans are no longer in charge of the Church at Goa Velha or of any other Church in the State. Some of the saints of their order are not among the popular of saints in Goa. But, the procession continues or rather it was once stopped, but then revived and has evolved from a penitential rite to almost a festival. The Tourism department promotes it on its website and the former Chief Minister, Manohar Parrikar, had even announced plans to give the procession the status of a State Festival, in the early days on taking charge of the State in 2012. The only change this procession has seen is the addition of a statue of St Joseph Vaz, Goa’s own and only Saint to the list of saints that emerge from the Church.
Goa has maintained a fine balance between tradition and modernity in its daily life as well as in its social thinking and practices, walking this tightrope with admirable dexterity. Modernity, as opposed to modernisation or modernism is, as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary, an intellectual tendency or social perspective characterized by departure from or repudiation of traditional ideas, doctrines, and cultural values in favour of contemporary or radical values and beliefs. And Goa has at times been quite radical in its changes, while still staying true to its traditions.
While Goa has opened itself to modernity, it has not closed its doors to its traditions that have been passed on through the generations. While traditions around religions and culture have been maintained, those that surround economic aspects and careers or professional approaches have been sundered. That is not peculiar just to Goa and is perhaps happening across the world. Very soon, sometime next month there will come the feast of Our Lady of Milagres in Mapusa and the zatra of Goddess Lairai in Shirgao. These two are considered sisters and till date members of the two majority communities in Goa participate in both festivities. The people of Mapusa send flowers to Goddess Lairai and the people of Shirgao send oil to the Milagres Saibinn. That’s a tradition that hasn’t been broken, but those that have been broken are other.
If in traditional cultures, and very few do exist today, the work that the parents and grandparents did is continued with, in today’s Goa the youth, just as in most places elsewhere in the world, are loath to take up the profession of their parents. They will, however, perpetuate some of the beliefs of their parents. In the current period, finding a coconut plucker or toddy tapper is a tough task in the State, but getting a group of people to defend the coconut tree’s status as a tree is far easier. While the latter is good for the future of the State, there is vigilance against government misdemeanours, where are the coconut pluckers and toddy tappers going to come from? Goa today depends on migrants for most jobs, yet remains steadfast in its desire to maintain its land and its traditions. But it is not just for odd jobs that it is looking for migrants. In the case of Goa Velha’s procession of Saints, once only the male residents of the village were allowed to shoulder the statues, and they did it with pride, but as many have since migrated to the United Kingdom, those from the neighbouring villages are now joining the males of Goa Velha to take the saints out in procession. Tradition, in this case, has been forced to change due to circumstances, which have changed because the youth have decided to not follow the profession of their parents.
Modern tools have helped perpetuate traditions in the State. As change has come constantly, the thin cord that attaches the current generation to the past and ensures continuity dissolves into modernity. Goa has maintained its traditions but tweaked them ever so slightly to suit the present times. This mix of the present and the past has merged so well that few would find it odd today. That is in a way is what Goa has done to the penitential procession of Saints that comes during Lent and just six days before the Catholic Church’s Holy Week. The State Tourism Department on its website mentions quite clearly that though this comes in the ‘subdued period of Lent’ every house in the village has guests, and that the ‘evening atmosphere is filled with gaiety as the fair comes to life on the main road outside the church’. Goa has retained the procession but given it a feel of a festival. Needless to say that across the world people live in a mix of the present and the past, and have been doing it successful, a case in point being the Procession of Saints of Goa Velha, where modernity had crept in, but the essence of the past lives on.
(The writer is Executive Editor, Herald)
