The NN’s souls-cult : a case study of catholicism and popular religion in Colombia

Title data

Bastidas Meneses, Luis Bernardo ; Kaden, Tom ; Schnettler, Bernt:
The NN’s souls-cult : a case study of catholicism and popular religion in Colombia.
In: Zeitschrift für Religion, Gesellschaft und Politik. Vol. 5 (2021) . - pp. 31-52.
ISSN 2510-1226
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41682-021-00075-z

Official URL:

Abstract in another language

This article analyzes the cult of the souls in Purgatory in Puerto Berrío, Colombia, and its relationship with the Catholic Church. Through empirical evidence, it identifies three characteristics of this cult, namely, its relative independence from the Catholic Church, its heterogeneity and its utilitarian character, and compares them with other cases of Latin American popular Catholicism. The particularities of the cult enable an analysis of how popular religion, rather than generating a conflict with the Catholic Church, maintains an ambiguous relationship with it. The case shows that popular religion not only incorporates the symbolic structure of the Catholic Church to legitimize itself, but also that the church tolerates it, contributing to the peaceful coexistence of the popular and the institutionalized. Consequently, this leads believers, instead of adhering to a supposed binary opposition, to shift between popular and institutionalized religion.

Further data

Item Type:	Article in a journal
Refereed:	Yes
Keywords:	Popular Catholicism; Popular religion; Death rituals; Religious change; Religion in Latin America
Institutions of the University:	Faculties > Faculty of Cultural Studies > Chair Sociology of Culture and Religion Faculties > Faculty of Cultural Studies > Chair Sociology of Culture and Religion > Chair Sociology of Culture and Religion - Univ.-Prof. Dr. Bernt Schnettler Faculties Faculties > Faculty of Cultural Studies
Result of work at the UBT:	Yes
DDC Subjects:	300 Social sciences > 300 Social sciences, sociology and anthropology
Date Deposited:	02 Sep 2021 07:58
Last Modified:	15 Mar 2022 09:59
URI:	https://eref.uni-bayreuth.de/id/eprint/66896