AN ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY ON SRI LANKAN ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH FEAST CEREMONY

Abstract

Sri Lanka is rich with various cultural projections, come from different cultural identities created under a multi-religious environment. Roman Catholicism is the second main religion in Sri Lanka and its historicity goes back to Sri Lanka's Portuguese colonial period, according to certified Archaeological evidence. This research work is aimed to study the ethnographic background of this proposed tradition of "Roman Catholic church feast ceremony" and give solutions to the lack of knowledge and attention driven to this area, by the current Sri Lankan Roman Catholic society. Questions in the identification of the difference between previous and current cultural features that conventionally separated from each churches, and evidence that can be substantially and commonly acceptable to certify this proposed event's historical timeline goes back to the Portuguese time, were addressed by this research. This research work was done in a qualitative methodology with primary and secondary resources such as, books, newspaper articles, e-resources and information collected by exploring in the field, including, some of the ancient Roman Catholic churches in Sri Lanka. Results of this research work can be divided into two parts as "revealing the historical environment" and "explaining the cultural characteristics". History of this tradition goes back to the prior British colonial period. Introduce of "Church feast flag hoisting ceremony by St. Joseph Vaz", and a historical "church feast ceremony" held at Kandy in the Portuguese colonial time can be considered as examples for the historicity mentioned earlier in the abstract. And, events like, "Karaththa Mangalyaya" in the feast of St. Anne's Church - Kattimahana, "Oru Mangalyaya" in the feast of St. Anne's Church Thalawila and some different "after feastday or pre-feast day Suruwam Perahera traditions" in separated churches can be included in the proposed "cultural characteristics explanation".