Romaria, reconciliação e celebração martirial: dispositivos rituais para a experiência de superação do pecado e da morte

Abstract

The present study aims to analyze the liturgical celebrations performed in the Pilgrimage of the Martyrs of the Latin American Walk as a ritual device capable of triggering experiences of reconciliation – along the lines of the Roman Catholic sacrament of penance – and, consequently, of overcoming death. Qualitative in nature, the research analyzes sin as a socio-anthropological and religious fact – in Jewish and Christian traditions, and in Latin American liberation Christianity. Then, it has descriptive clippings on the rites that make up the Pilgrimage of the Martyrs with the aim of finding connections between them and the sacrament of reconciliation. Finally, the study discusses the similarity between religious experience, ritual experience and martyrdom celebrations – all sensory and emotional, before being rational. The results found point in the direction that, for the religious subject, sin is identified with death, while death is the result of that one. Furthermore, it indicates a reversal in the human existential course. If the natural and observable course starts from life towards death, the rites celebrated in the Pilgrimage of the Martyrs suggest that the course starts from death towards life. Thus, death – which, for the believing man, is the fruit of sin – remains overcome. Therefore, the believer feels close to God, welcomed in the fellowship of the saints and, therefore, free from sin