Parish Church of
Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Gżira

During the time when Manoel Island was used by the Royal-Navy in World War II, British sailors used to frequent the bars on the Gżira seafront. One evening, a bar who was closing up for the night refused to serve three drunken sailors. In their inebriated state, they started to pelt stones at the facade of the bar which had a picture of Our Lady of Mount Carmel framed in a small window.
One of the stones lodged itself firmly in the glass pane, breaking it and damaging the picture.This sacreligious act led the ecclesiastical authorities to carry out a procession with the picture followed by three days of prayer.
Fr. Anton Manche, who was later to become the first parish priest, continued the keep the devotion in this area by turning a coach house into a small chapel. This chapel was so small that only few people could enter, the rest of the congregation had to stay outside, so a bigger chapel was built.
As Gżira’s population grew a request for the setting up of a new parish was made to Bishop Maurus Caruana and on the 15th of May 1921, Gżira was declared a parish dedicated to Our lady of Mount Carmel. Shortly after, Antonio Sammut purchased a plot of land and approached the parish priest of Gżira offering to supervise the construction of a new church for which he had drawn up a plan himself.
This was later endorsed by the ecclesiastical authorities and approved by architect Antonio Caruana.The building works began in 1921 and finished by 1935. The church was built in Doric style having a choir, two chapels, main nave and a vestry.

The titular statue of Mount Carmel was made in Lecce, Italy and arrived in Malta in June 1924.It was paid for Carmelo Pace after he was saved from drowning and attributed this to the intercession of Our Lady.