Celebrating Mary’s Feast in Bangalore

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St. Mary’s Basilica

St. Mary’s Basilica is the oldest church in Bangalore. It is located in the Shivaji nagar, next to Shivaji nagar bus stop. The institution was raised to the status of a Basilicaon the order of Pope John Paul VI in the year 1973. Mary’s Feast is celebrated with grand processions in this church every year.



As the church is centrally located, you can approach the church from Queen’s road side, from MG road, from Commercial Street, from Ulsoor lake side etc. However the place being in the heart of the city is overcrowded all the time.

The Mary’s feast celebration

The Mary’s feast is celebrated in the month of September. The Arch Bishop of Bangalore hoists flag in St. Mary’s Basilica to begin the festival. The festival continues for 9 days and ends on the 10<sup style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">th day with a car festival with grand procession.

Other activities are also organized such as thanks giving to elderly couples completing 50 years of marriage,

Celebrations around the church

Not only inside the church, you can find several idols of Mother Mary near the church with beautiful decorations. Usually the celebration continues for 10 days. The last day is celebrated with the car festival with huge crowd.



The above is a Mary’s statue decorated outside the church. These are temporary statues made specifically for this occasion. Similarly below is another temporary decoration on the roadside near the Basilica.

Celebrations inside Basilica

Thousands of people visit the church on this day. People have to stand on a long queue (picture below). Although the crowd is there for the whole day, the length of the queue increases as the time become closer to car festival.



Inside the church, the idol of mother Mary is finely decorated. Many priests take care of various aspects of the festival on the day. The idol of Jesus is also decorated and worshiped in a grand way.

The car festival

The last day of the 10-day long Mary’s feast is celebrated with a car festival. People start gathering in the mid day. The security forces create cordons around the church and don’t allow the crowd to go inside. Ave Maria music and prayers are chanted through loud speakers. Priests from various places come and gather here.



A chariot is decorated with beautiful flowers, lights etc. The idol of mother Mary is placed on it. Some highly ranked priests/ bishops sit on the chariot. Band parties play their music and drums. The place becomes fully crowded.



The Chariot is beautifully decorated. Especially the lights are arranged in a beautiful way. As they give different colors of light, each picture of the chariot will look different. Thousands of people go along with the Chariot. Although people here are generally disciplined, the law and order is maintained by a large number of police.



The festival is celebrated not only by the Christians but people of other religions too. As the Shivaji nagar area is more populated by the Muslims, having shops and businesses, they also get involved in the festival in various ways. The car festival is attended by thousands of people from across different religions.

Some important tips

Parking vehicles in the car festival will be a great problem, as such there is hardly any parking place in Shivaji Nagar. Besides on the day of Mary’s feast the traffic police will not allow any vehicle to enter from a km. If you are taking your vehicle then be ready to park it somewhere at 2 kms distance. Alternatively go by public transport till MG road or Queens road or some place nearby and then take a walk to the church.



St. Mary’s basilica is a 300 years old Church and organizing daily prayers. People of different religions visit it. You can visit it on any day, even if not in Mary’s feast.

Photography is allowed inside the church, you can take beautiful pictures of mother Mary and other views around.

There is possibility of having mild rainfall during September. Twice I got completely wet while watching car festival. Be prepared for that too.

(This article was first posted in Journalsite.tk )

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