The patroness of Avola is Saint Venera, celebrated on the last Sunday of July, and the church that bears her name is among the dearest to the town. Little is known about her, and that little is uncertain: the name is the Latin form of Parasceve, by which the Orthodox Church venerates her, and a catalogue of saints written between 1369 and 1372 by the Venetian Pietro de' Natali calls her a virgin born in Gaul in the 2nd century and martyred in Rome in the time of Antoninus Pius. Her memorial, once on 14 November, was removed from the Roman Martyrology in the 2004 edition because the figure is so unlikely to be historical; the cult, on the other hand, has stayed alive in many Italian towns, and Avola is one of them.
The local calendar has two more heartfelt dates: the feast of Saint Sebastian on the second Sunday of May and that of Saint Joseph on 19 March. The town that hosts them is recent compared with its saint: after the earthquake of 9 and 11 January 1693, Avola was rebuilt lower down, towards the sea, at the wish of Prince Nicolò Pignatelli Aragona and to a design by the Jesuit Angelo Italia, with the hexagonal plan it still has.
