Abstract
This chapter is based on field research1 analyzing a special form of pilgrimage in Brazil: the Romaria da Terra and the social and political function of this liturgical praxis in the struggle for land in Brazil. From this analysis, we try to obtain contributions for reflections on liturgy in the Latin American context.
Translated from Portuguese by Walter O. Schlupp, schlupp@sinos.net.
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Notes
3.8 million units out of 4.6 million total rural properties are smaller than 100 hectares. Half of the landowners own less than 10 hectares. This means land concentration in Brazil is one of the most extreme worldwide. A. Jacobs, Es ist dunkel aber ich singe (Erlangen: Bkv, 1992), 26.
V. Westhelle, “Os sinais dos lugares: As dimensões esquecidas,” in Peregrinação, ed. M. Dreher (São Leopoldo, 1990), p. 256.
See Marcelo Barros de Souza and J. L. Caravias, Theologie der Erde (Düsseldorf: Patmos, 1990), 62. It is only since 1950 that political elements have been consciously used in movements of rural resistance.
Cf. J. de Souza Martins, Os camponeses e a política no Brasil (Petrópolis: Vozes, 1995), 10.
See Ione Buyst, “Teologia e liturgia na perspectiva da América Latina,” in Eu sou o que sou, ed. C. Favreto and Ivanir A. Rampon (Passo Fundo: Berthier, 2008), 38–76.
Balbinot deals exhaustively with this aspect. Egídio Balbinot, Liturgia e política: A dimensão política da liturgia nas romarias da Terra de Santa Catarina (Chapecó: Grifos, 1998).
See also Michael Jagessar and Stephen Burns, Christian Worship: Postcolonial Perspectives (Sheffield/Oakville: Equinox, 2011).
Ione Buyst, Como estudar liturgia: Princípios de ciência litúrgica (São Paulo: Paulinas, 1990), 53.
K.-H. Bieritz, “Fundamentos antropológicos,” in Manual de ciência litúr-gica, vol. 1, ed. Hans-Christoph Schmidt-Lauber, Michael Meyer-Blanck, and Kar-Heinrich Bieritz (São Leopoldo: EST/Sinodal, 2011), 152–153.
See also studies of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) on worship and culture; particularly the articles by Gordon W. Lathrop and J. Anskar Chupungo, who have richly discussed the countercultural impetus of worship and liturgy. Anita Staufer, ed., Christlicher Gottesdienst: Einheit in kultureller Vielfalt (Genf/Hannover, LWB/VELKD, 1996). (Also translated into Spanish).
C. A. Steil, O sertão das romarias: Estudo antropológico sobre o santuário de Bom Jesus da Lapa (Petrópolis : Vozes, 1996), 285.
G. M. Martin, Fest und Alltag: Bausteine zu einer Theorie des Festes (Stuttgart/ Berlin/Köln/Mainz: Kohlhammer, 1973).
M. Augé, Los no lugares: Espacios del anonimato (Barcelona: Gedisa, 2000).
Marcelo Barros and Artur Peregrino, A Festa dos pequenos: Romarias da Terra no Brasil (São Paulo: Paulus, 1996).
Cox, Harvey, The Feast of Fools: A Theological Essay on Festivity and Fantasy (Berlin: Harper and Row, 1972), 21.
On liturgy and play (Spiel), see also Ernst Lange, Predigen als Beruf: Aufsätze zu Homiletik, Liturgie und Pfarramt (München: Kaiser, 1987), 83–95.
J. Moltmann, Die ersten Freigelassenen der Schöpfung: Versuche über die Freude an der Freiheit und das Wohlgefallen am Spiel (München: Kaiser, 1971).
J. J. von Allmen, O culto cristão: Teologia e prática (São Paulo: Aste, 1968), 60.
Anita Staufer (ed.), Christlicher Gottesdienst: Einheit in kultureller Vielfalt (Genf/Hannover: LWB/VELKD, 1996).
Displacement as such has nothing to do specifically with Third World poverty. Displacement and local identity loss nowadays are present in diverse cultures worldwide. A further study by LWF has focused precisely on this local dimension, the loss of places and its theological dimension: The theological significance of the question of land or territory can be framed precisely in the conjunction between the place that provides for the sustenance of life and the animated space in which the spiritual dimensions of existence, the space of the sacred, the space of feast, can flourish. V. Westhelle, “Re(li)gion: The lord of History and the Illusory Space,” in Region & Religion: Land, Territory and Nation from a Theological Perspective, ed. V. Mortensen (Geneva: LWF, 1994), 85.
James F. White, “Introduction to Christian worship: 3rd Edition: Revised and Enlarged,” (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2001), 142–143.
K.-H. Bieritz, “Heimat Gottesdienst?” inTheologisches geschenkt: Festschrift für M. Josuttis, ed. C. Bizer, J. Cornelius-Bundschuh, and H.-M. Gutmann (Bovenden: Foedus, 1996), 265–266.
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Adam, J.C. (2015). Liturgy with Your Feet: The Romaria da Terra Pilgrimage in Paraná, Brazil: Reappropriating Liturgical Rites in the Quest for Life Spaces and Their Liberation. In: Carvalhaes, C. (eds) Liturgy in Postcolonial Perspectives. Postcolonialism and Religions. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137508270_12
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