The government group Arona will promote an institutional motion in which it urges the Cabildo de Tenerife to declare the Pilgrimage of Our Lady of Fátima del Valle San Lorenzo an Asset of Intangible Cultural Interest (BIC), due to its evident wealth of heritage, uniqueness and historical value, with more than 70 years of antiquity. To this is added an ingredient of great interest, that of the space in which it is celebrated, La Centinela, located in the Roque de Jama complex, one of the great archaeological and natural treasures of Tenerife.
The motion, promoted by the Department of Historical Heritage, also contemplates that the City Council promote research and rescue projects for all the cultural assets associated with the traditional festival, as well as develop all the necessary and timely actions so that the pilgrimage is declared BIC. The motion will be taken to plenary next week.
For the mayor of Arona, José Julián Mena, the declaration as BIC of the Pilgrimage of Our Lady of Fátima, “responds to the dignity and strengthening of a fundamental festival for Valle San Lorenzo, festivals that have special roots for the entire town of Arona”. Mena emphasizes the importance of protecting this tradition, “so that it can be preserved and transmitted to future generations, making possible, through it, generational encounters, harmony and community life. The Pilgrimage of Fátima has become an identity element of the town and the City Council has a duty to protect it, as well as our main heritage elements. Undoubtedly, the Valle San Lorenzo Pilgrimage gathers sufficient values to achieve the classification of Asset of Cultural Interest”.
The Pilgrimage of Our Lady of Fátima was born as a manifestation of popular devotion and regional pilgrimage around the Virgin of Fátima, and evolved to become one of the most attractive in the South of the Island. Its antiquity dates back more than 70 years of history, since as early as 1950, on May 13, a first image moved on a pilgrimage to La Centinela.
After a few years of interruption, the Pilgrimage of Fátima was resumed with force in 1973, by the hand of a group of young people interested in recovering the devotional, festive and cultural values of the celebration, merging values of the ethnographic tradition with signs of the modernity. Half a century after that, the Pilgrimage of Fátima has been consolidated in the San Lorenzo Valley, in the municipality and in the surrounding area.
