Simulated sanctity in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Malta

Abstract

Revelations, apparitions, voices, stigmata, and ecstasies were extraordinary phenomena and profoundly emotional, in which God was perceived as communicating with human beings through bodily phenomena. It was up to churchmen to regulate and control divine intervention in daily life and separate truth from deceit. But attempting to fulfil this pastoral duty was a complicated matter. Were these experiences authentic, really proceeding from God or were they illusions of the devil, the deceiver par excellence and able to capture human trust? Furthermore, besides the devil's deceit, might there not also be an element of human simulation or 'false sanctity', that is, a true of lies and hypocrisy? This was the art of the actor, who makes the audience believe what is untrue. Hypocrites have one sole aim: to obtain praise and fame through the exercise of sham virtues. Pope Sixtus V in 1588 set up the Congregation of Rites, which established a more rigid approach to the canonization of saints. All the same, the form that 'true' sanctity was to assume was a complex matter. The difficulty arose because there were diverse models of sanctity. There was, for instance, the search for the experience of martyrdom for the faith, which pushed young men to enter missionary orders and to set sail for non-European lands. However, besides this heroic type of sanctity, exclusively male, there was an alternative type of devotion, restricted to a tiny circle and especially evident among women, which culminated in ecstasies and raptures. This paper analyses the context of this kind of religiosity in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Malta. It examines fourteen women who came to the attention of the Holy Office between 1677 and 1772 because of their supposed special privileges from heaven. Who were these women and what made them feign holiness? What strategies did they adopt to make their audiences think of them as saints? Why were they perceived as a substantial threat to the Church? And how was it that the Roman Inquisition got involved with such matters? Finally, was it always for reasons of 'religion' that the inquisitors proceeded against them?