Keeping, caring and claiming: O’odham Indians at Mission San Xavier del Bac
According to scholars, Native American Catholics live two parallel religious lives: ‘institutional’ Catholicism is juxtaposed to ‘popular religion.’ The Tohono O’odham of Southern Arizona seem to be a prominent example of this: the O’odham practice santo himdaq devotion to santos in small chapels. T...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic/Print Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
[2017]
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| In: |
Culture and religion
Year: 2017, Volume: 18, Issue: 3, Pages: 263-277 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Folk religion
/ Catholic church
/ Mission (international law
/ Franciscans
/ Jesuits
/ Arizona
/ Papago
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| IxTheo Classification: | BB Indigenous religions CC Christianity and Non-Christian religion; Inter-religious relations KBQ North America |
| Further subjects: | B
Jesuit missions
B Franciscan missions B Mission San Xavier del Bac B O’odham Indians B Native American Catholicism B Spanish Catholic Missions |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | According to scholars, Native American Catholics live two parallel religious lives: ‘institutional’ Catholicism is juxtaposed to ‘popular religion.’ The Tohono O’odham of Southern Arizona seem to be a prominent example of this: the O’odham practice santo himdaq devotion to santos in small chapels. These devotions and indigenous practices contrast with the institutional church. Seemingly, ‘indigenised’ Catholicism is dearer to these Native groups than the central, official Church. However, this paper examines San Xavier Mission Church’s centrality both to Mission clergy and to O’odham Catholics as a place of mutual reverence. The historical examinations of the Mission Church have fixated on its Spanish origins without examining its importance to the O’odham. The church was left in the care of O’odham Indians for decades in the nineteenth century during the years of secularisation (1841-1912). I examine this care, the significance of the Mission Church to establishing the San Xavier Reservation, and the O’odham adoption of the church as their own, as well as comparing ‘institutional’ Catholicism with santo himdaq. The mission sheds light on the fluidity of missional power and social relations, the problems with essentialising Catholicism, and the changing nature of religious exchange, importance and practice over time. |
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| ISSN: | 1475-5610 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Culture and religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/14755610.2017.1358192 |