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A Post-Secular Spirituality in a Religious Tourism

Publication at Hussite Theological Faculty |
2018

Abstract

Pilgrimage and tourism are often depicted as opposite end-points. While the first one is associated with religion, sacredness and asceticism, the second one is portrayed as a secular, profane and hedonistic activity.

Based on the ethnographic study of local catholic pilgrimage, this study challenges such conventional dichotomy. it points out to post-secular nature of current religious landscape where "traditional" religiosity is mixed and connected with so called "alternative" or "detraditionalized" spirituality. By using prominent post-secular discourses - therapeutic and energetic discourses - pilgrims transcend pilgrimage-tourism dichotomy and construct new patterns of their lived religion.

This article proposes to use the term "religious tourism" for such types of daily religious mobile practices.