It was when Godfrey Baldacchino, in the course of his very interesting talk, quoted on screen a particularly rasping sentence from last Sunday’s article by Daphne Caruana Galizia, about Gozo being a priest-ridden island, that I found myself the unwilling centre of attention at Heritage Malta’s third international conference held on Friday at the Grand Hotel.

I could hear muttering and “Tschs” all around me, as the bishop’s keen eyes bored through the intervening layers of people.

The morning session at the conference was entitled Island territories and cultural heritage: fragility or resilience?

Professor Baldacchino explained how local heritage has been turned into a kitsch appendage to Maltese society. The Maltese show they remain completely anchored to the Stone Age, that they think nothing of transforming a xaghra into a golf course or even better into building blocks.

History for the Maltese is something to do with tourism; in reality there is no great pride in the Maltese about their history. Most of what the Maltese consider as their history is actually the goings-on of the soldiery of imperial powers. The Maltese flag is the only flag in the world with an emblem of a foreign country, while the so-called “Knights of Malta” came from every country in the world except Malta. The single fact that we have five national days shows the difficulty in agreeing on dates of national significance, especially if recent.

In conclusion, Prof. Baldacchino urged the celebration of Gozo-ism and urged Gozitans to strive for more jurisdiction as well as to seek more inclusion on national political platforms.

Bishop Mario Grech prefaced his remarks by saying that he was speaking as a citizen and as a Christian. He quoted from both profane sources, such as WTO documents, as well as from past and present popes on what tourism should be. He also quoted from Anton Abela on the actual impact of tourism on Maltese society, especially on interpersonal relationships and social change.

He insisted on what he called ethical tourism and responsibility, in preference to what is known as sustainable tourism, but admitted this is in stark contrast to how modern stakeholders in tourism see things – good life, profits, business and growth.

It was only in his concluding paragraph that the bishop, again quoting a pope, spoke of the positive impact of tourism on cultural exchange and dialogue between cultures.

All high-flown rhetoric was then brought down to earth by Lino Bugeja of the Ramblers Association, who informed the gathering that even as they spoke, Ras il-Wardija, with enormous scenic value plus Punic and Hellenic remains as well as possibly Bronze Age pottery and cart ruts, was being hi-jacked. Until a few months ago, this site was accessible but now anybody who draws near is threatened with dogs, guns and pellets. Could it be, as Lino Briguglio had said earlier, that we have too much heritage and we think we can waste any amount of it?

If such matters are not dealt with, Mr Bugeja concluded, this entire conference would be just verbal diarrhoea.