The patron of Porto Empedocle is Saint Gerland, and his holiday falls on 25 February.
The town's oldest event, however, is the feast of the Madonna del Carmine, celebrated every year since 1863: it lasts three days, the Friday, Saturday and Sunday after 16 July, and ends when the crowd returns together with the sacred effigy to the Chiesa Madre. The town's other great feast is that of Saint Calogero, the so-called black saint, especially venerated in many towns across Sicily: the festivities begin on the Thursday before the first Sunday of September, when in a solemn procession the saint's 19th-century statue leaves the chapel in the dockworkers' house, where it is normally kept and venerated.
