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Pope Pius XII was known for his Marian orientation. To make the Church more solemn in celebrating the centenary of the proclamation of the dogma of Mary's Immaculate Conception, he proclaimed 1954 the »Marian Year«, the first in the history of the Church. The scarce Slovene Church press regularly reported on the Jubilee and presented individual highlights at length. The faithful were invited to attend various devotions and to pray a special prayer in honour of Mary, composed by the Pope himself. In the eyes of the Slovenian judicial authorities, the prayer was an expression of criticism of the social situation, an attempt to overthrow the constitutional order, opposition to revolutionary changes and an attack on democracy, so they banned it and confiscated all printed copies. The legal proceedings against the prayer began in Maribor and continued all the way to Belgrade.

The aim of this study was to analyse the motivations of the participants of the festivity in honour of Our Lady of Antime in Fafe (located in the north of Portugal) and provide an overview of the tourism opportunities and impacts associated with the event. To this end, the study analysed the main events on the programme for the 2024 edition of this religious festivity. According to the interviews and participant observations, the impact of the religious festivity in honour of Our Lady of Antime on the faithful who participated was evident. For this study, semi-structured face-to-face interviews and participant observations were conducted, and the former were recorded for subsequent content analysis and categorisation. Participant observation was conducted, focusing on the events that occurred during the religious festivity in honour of the Lady of Antime. The limitations of this study relate to the fact that this is a resource that has not yet been explored as a lever for religious tourism in the municipality, although it has received more media attention in recent years. After carrying out this study, it was possible to conclude that the religious festivity in honour of Our Lady of Antime is attracting more and more believers, and that this event has become a resource that is complementary to the basic tourist resources of the destination of Fafe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Ethos (0860-8024) is the property of John Paul II Institute, Faculty of Philosophy, John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper constitutes an encompassing account of the Madonna of Orsanmichele in all its historical instances. As source of the first miracle ever recorded in the city-state of Florence, in 1292, the Orsanmichele Madonna generated a cult that lasted centuries. Considering the extravagant artistic commissions on the site of the granary-turned-church, Orsanmichele became a place of religious worship, and, more importantly, grown into being equated with the political and spiritual identity of Florence. The panel by Bernando Daddi and the tabernacle designed by Andrea Orcagna have generated, I argue, a parallel cult – one revering the exquisite artistic draughtsman ship of the painting and that of its monumental shrine. In this paper I aim to present the dialogue between the Marian cult located at Orsanmichele, starting in the thirteenth century, and the artistic patronage prompted by the popularity of the miracle-making image of the Virgin. My study represents a critical re-visitation of the prominent book by Megan Holmes, The Miraculous Image in Renaissance Florence, published in 2013.

Copyright of Cuadernos Dieciochistas is the property of Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The purpose of the article is to characterize the religious situation in the Recovered Territories at the end of 1940s through a case study of the events from Sulęcin. The author assumed that the new settlers were people of deep faith who cultivated old traditions. This enabled them to adjust to the new conditions following their forcible relocation from the Eastern to Western areas. The research problem focuses on the extraordinary event of bringing to Sulęcin a copy of the Miraculous Icon of Our Lady of Jasna Góra in Częstochowa, on August 28, 1949. The following research questions were posed: why did the new settlers undertake this initiative, did they do it without the consent of communist authorities, who was the main originator of the events, as well as, what happened to him and to the copy of the painting thereafter. The settlers were distinguished by their strong Marian devotion. Traditional pilgrimages to Jasna Góra in Częstochowa were one way to show this. In August 1949, communist authorities denied permission for the settlers from Sulęciris Catholic parish to go on pilgrimage to Częstochowa. They decided to covertly bring a copy of the painting of Our Lady of Częstochowa to Sulęcin. The painting hangs in the church of St. Nicolas in Sulęcin to this day, serving as a symbol of local identity and integration of the parish community. The hypothesis concerning the settlers' religiousness was confirmed, and shown to help them adapt to their new surroundings. On a methodological level, source analysis and comparative analysis were conducted. The article was based on sources such as archival documents, personal memories and local press accounts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the middle of the twentieth century tensions arose in American Catholicism surrounding clothing and modest femininity. As more revealing garments made their way into popular culture, Catholics began to both emphasize and question the importance of modest clothing. Two groups emerged to promote the modesty cause. Supply the Demand for the Supply was a youth-led activist group and the Marilyke Crusade was a priest-led purity initiative. Both groups were influenced by the rise in popular devotion to Our Lady of Fatima, rooted in Marian symbolism, and emphasized the importance of full coverage fashion as it related to Catholic values. Despite their similarities, the two groups functioned separately from one another and under distinctly different identities. This article compares the history and activities of the two groups while analyzing lived religion through Catholic material culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses Marian Societies in Nigeria with the aim of highlighting their various spiritualities and therefore, engender more devotion to our Blessed Mother. The Church has, in her various Mariological teachings, emphasized the role of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the history of salvation, as well as her maternal intercessory role in the lives of Christians. This has given rise to various Marian devotions with varying spiritualities. This study begins with an introduction and clarification of relevant terms. It presents the origin of Marian devotions and discusses five popular Marian devotions: Our Lady Queen of All Hearts, The Legion of Mary, The Blue Army of our Lady of Fatima, The Block Rosary Crusade and The Mary League Association. It emphasizes the importance of devotion to Mary and addresses some misconceptions about the Church's devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, explaining the nature of true devotion. The article exposes the extremism of Marianism, which is a danger to Marian spirituality, and concludes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pearl is a Middle English dream-poem in London, British Library, ms Cotton Nero A.x, of about 1400. It is attributed to the same author as the scriptural poems Patience and Cleanness and the romance Sir Gawain and the Green Knight also found in this manuscript. The four texts provide abundant information on fourteenth-century social life, including religion, particularly for devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Analysis of Marian imagery in Pearl and its related poems thus tells us much on the attitudes to Christ's mother of a high-ranking provincial layman of about 1390, especially for her as ‘Queen of Heaven’ and ‘Queen of Courtesy’, the latter term denoting the values of court society. Such analysis also tends to confirm attribution on other grounds of the four poems to Sir John Stanley (d. 1414), a magnate and courtier who in the last thirty years of his life dominated the politics of the Lancashire-Cheshire region of north-west England.

The paper presents an analysis of two prayers by Ildefonso of Toledo addressed to Mary contained in the work "De virginitate Sanctae Mariae". Both the very personal form of the prayers and their content deserve attention. In these prayers, the Bishop of Toledo expresses his deepest feelings towards Mary, describing her as his Lady and Sovereign. He praises her for her participation in the work of salvation, but above all he asks her intercession so that he can be united with Christ. In doing so, he indicates what true Marian devotion consists of: it should always lead to a deepening of the relationship with Christ. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Memoria y Civilizacion is the property of Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Navarra, S.A. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In the summer of 1835, a banner arrived at the «camp and court» of Don Carlos, a banner with an image of Our Lady of Sorrows. Immediately, the Virgin Mary, under this title, was proclaimed «generalísima» of the «royal army» of Don Carlos. In the history of this banner, there are many elements of the political culture of early Carlists. This article examines this history by underlying the political and cultural contexts in which it developed.

If virginity had a sound, it would sound like the Virgin Mary, according to devotional sources from New Spain intended for the indoctrination and spiritual contemplation of cloistered nuns. This article traces that allegory from its inception in reflections on biblical narratives of Mary's life to some of the most complicated theological musings on the nature of the Virgin's soul. Through the lens of gender and voice studies, this essay examines rare literature, music manuscripts, and visual art of New Spain and shows how virginity was socially constructed and deployed as a type of sonic instruction of Mary's essence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

East-Timor is the most Catholic country in Asia, with independence in 2002. The aim of this article is to analyze Marian devotion in the country, its cultural roots and its vocation as a Catholic expression that illuminates and inspires the region. The methodology is a literature review and dialogue between the authors, one of them being a east-timor priest. In this article, two localities stand out as Marian shrines and is reflected on their meanings: The National Shrine of Aitara, located in a sacred place, passes through resignification: from the site of the tree of the sticking, becomes the tree of healing; the place of suffering and torment becomes relief and encouragement. The "little girl" - the Virgin of Aitara - becomes the Great Protector, radiating a message of redemption and blessing to the whole region. The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fatima, on the Ramelau peak, brings three traditional characteristics for East-Timor people: geographically it is in the center of the country, occupies its highest place, is a sacred place of transcendence of rest of the ancestors. Ramelaus has also become a real and symbolic space of resistance to Indonesian occupation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subject of this paper is an analysis of manuscript and printed sources on the pilgrimage site of Sepekov (Písek district). These comprise texts written between the 1730s and the 1780s. Thematically, these are mostly books of miracles, which were intended to record miraculous events in writing and (in the case of printed sources) to spread awareness of the existence and importance of the pilgrimage site; however, they also contain information on the history of Marian devotion in Sepekov. Most of these works are anonymous; nevertheless, since the books of miracles were mostly written by parish priests, the identification of the likely authors is based on the analysis of the staffing of the church administration in Sepekov by the Strahov Premonstratensians. An interesting aspect is the intermingling of the works of the Premonstratensians and the local layman, teacher and sacristan František Strejček. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Teología is the property of Pontificia Universidad Catolica Argentina and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In the Middle Ages, the image of a sunbeam passing through glass or crystal was a popular metaphor for explaining Mary's perpetual virginity. One of the most frequently repeated quotations that employs this metaphor has long been attributed to the twelfth-century Cistercian abbot St Bernard of Clairvaux, which might suggest that the emergent Gothic style contributed to its contemporaneous propagation in text and image. However, this much-repeated quotation is in fact the commentary of a seventeenth-century Dominican scholar, who mixed a widespread medieval trope with Bernard's own discourse. A reevaluation of the use of the sunbeam motif in text and image suggests that, whereas it was commonly used to explain the Virgin Birth in literature, in visual art it was more frequently associated with the Incarnation. Furthermore, as I argue, the translation of the motif from text to image appears to have been catalyzed by a materially focused affective piety and the devotional texts of late medieval mystics such as the Meditationes vitae Christi and St Bridget of Sweden's Revelations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the west façade of Wells Cathedral has been carefully studied, a series of problems concerning its date, original form and meaning remain. This paper focuses on the archaeology of its central portal, featuring the Coronation of the Virgin. Working from the archaeological evidence, it offers a reconstruction of the portal which leads to a broader consideration of the place of the imagery in British and European medieval art. This informs an exploration of the meanings of the façade as a whole within the context of then current commentaries on the Song of Songs in France and England. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Annals of Theology / Roczniki Teologiczne is the property of Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawla II and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Annals of Theology / Roczniki Teologiczne is the property of Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawla II and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Based on two field studies on the micro level of items which place-makers and merchants display at holy sites, an argument about the supply side of the political economy of pilgrimage is proposed. Place-makers and merchants rely on the established pilgrims’ traditions but differ concerning innovations. Place-makers are the principals of the sites and invest in innovations in order to secure the site’s long-term performance. Merchants rely on short-term purchase decisions of the pilgrims. They prefer tried and tested products and look for novelties which fits in the pattern of success. While the resilience of placemakers demonstrate the power of the supply side, the cautiousness of the merchants hints to its limits. Rome during Francis’ Jubilee of Mercy and the Bavarian Marian shrine Altötting in the years after the resignation of Pope Benedict XVI are the case studies to illustrate these claims in the perspective of Marian and papal pilgrimage.

Copyright of Vox Patrum is the property of Wydzial Teologii KUL and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Galician Journal of Economics / Revista Galega de Economía is the property of Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Servicio de Publicaciones and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Devotional writing, particularly that which disseminates miracles, accounts of sanctuary foundations and stories of old and new cults, occupies an essential place in modern Spain. In the seventeenth century, such productions continued to progress, and, at the same time, to evolve in their forms and in their objectives: religious literature could then become the site of political confrontation. The struggles around patronage became more and more acute at the end of the century when changing forms reflected shifting tensions, as shown in particular by the controversy between Juan de Vera Tasis – who wrote the Historia del origen, invención y milagros de la sagrada imagen de Na Sa de la Almudena, published in Madrid in 1692 – and Father Agustin Cano – who wrote a response to the former text and published it in 1694 under the title La verdad triunfante. Tratado apologético en defensa de la antigüedad, propriedad y patronato de Na Sa de Atocha in Madrid, contra las novedades que don Juan de vera tassis intenta sin razon introducir en la Historia que ha publicado de la Milagrosa imagen de la Almudena. Various issues came together in this open struggle between patronages, which involved the uses of religious writing, a transfer of sacrality, and political dynamics both local and national, especially as Madrid was the capital. The analysis of this particular case reveals the links between politico-religious issues and the evolution of forms and writing methods, as well as of the status of authors.

Copyright of Hipogrifo: revista de literatura y cultura del siglo de oro is the property of Hipogrifo: revista de literatura y cultura del siglo de oro and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Annals of Cultural Studies / Roczniki Kulturoznawcze is the property of John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Institute of Cultural Studies and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Zbornik Odsjeka za Povijesne Znanosti. Zavoda za Povijesne i Društvene Znanosti is the property of Hrvatska Akademija Znanosti i Umjetnosti, Zavod za Povijesne i Drustvene Znanosti and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

A widely popular concept among Orthodox Christians is that religious images as intermediaries between man and God (the Mother of God or the saints) can give material signs of the divine presence on Earth and often do so. First comes the veneration of miracle-working icons, which are connected to narratives of miraculous events and considered the most helpful mediators for prayers addressed to God, the Virgin or a saint. Another popular notion is that icons can miraculously renew themselves or exude holy oil or blood, and give out fragrance. Two cases of largescale myrrh-gushing from the recent years offer different examples of the emergence, development and interpretation of such miraculous events in Orthodox shrines. The first case is from the town of Terespol in Eastern Poland (since 2010) and the second one comes from the town of Shumen in Northern Bulgaria (from 2017). In the Polish case, the myrrh-streaming continued for a long period of time, encompassed other icons as well and was accompanied by stories of miraculous healings. It was approved by the Church as a manifestation of divine nature. All these occurrences gave an impetus to the development of the veneration of the myrrh-streaming icon of the Theotokos Gorgoepēkoos (She Who Is Quick to Hear) and stimulated pilgrimage to the town. In the case from Bulgaria there was also large-scale myrrh-streaming, but it happened only once, at the feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God (15 August). The event was accepted just as a divine sign and was interpreted mainly as given for the sake of penance and strengthening of faith. The fact that no myrrh was gathered and there were no consequent miracles made the Church take a more passive position and the local bishop just unofficially referred to the general Orthodox idea of myrrh-streaming icons. Events of this kind, which were traditionally taken for miracles, often provoke scepticism and doubts of falsification in modern times. For that reason, they are examined by committees appointed by the Church or inspected by bishops, and even submitted to chemical tests. All these processes emphasize the icons’ multifaceted presence in local communities and in society in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the 1990s there was a growing and renewed interest on the practice of clothing images of saints after, as Richard Trexler put it, the negligence demonstrated towards it by art historians until then. In 2018, following the publication of new and unprejudiced studies about it, the presence of two dresses belonging to statues of the Virgin Mary in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's exhibition "Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination" testified to the impact clothed images had on fashion creators and, according to David Morgan, the Church's ritual and performative life. While focusing on the miraculous image of Nossa Senhora da Lapa from Quintela, Portugal, this article aims to acknowledge the many roles played by its clothes and jewels, assessing the complexity of this phenomenon and aiming for a wider understanding of how the faithful engaged with devotional sculpture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In An Inquiry into the Modes of Existence, which addresses itself to the profound challenge of how to "compose" a common world in the Anthropocene, Bruno Latour proposes that the mode of religion [REL] offers a model for all the others-that of reprise. Emerging from the practice of biblical exegesis, reprise refers to an open-ended process of meaning making opposed to the rigid certainties of fundamentalism. [REL] also contributes a concept of radical transformation through love ("conversion"). For Latour, two events from the Virgin Mary's life-the Annunciation and the Assumption- illustrate reprise and conversion, both of which are necessary in coming to terms with monogeism, the knowledge that there is only one world. This essay examines Latour's proposed relationship between reprise and conversion through a consideration of late medieval Marian devotion. Focusing on vernacular accounts of Mary's Assumption, it argues that reprise leads to violent as well as loving conversions; indeed, violence can proceed in the name of love. The essay concludes that composition, reprise, and conversion come together in ways that trouble late medieval accounts of the Assumption, the mode of religion, and life in the Anthropocene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1891, the founder of the Matadi mission commissioned a master sculptor in Ghent to create a neo-gothic Madonna and child with a kneeling, imploring African released from the shackles of slavery at the Virgin's feet. "Our Lady of Congo" was expected by its creators to become the tutelary figure of the new colony. In Belgium, it was successfully used as missionary propaganda, notably by the Society for Congolese Children, a pious association settled in Ghent to ransom young slaves in the Congo Free State. Yet the sculpture only had mixed success in the Leopoldian colony. It took part in the creation of a nostalgic space for the missionaries of Matadi, but failed to elicit the devotedness of the local population, despite over three centuries of Kongo Christianity elaborated by the local elites and the Catholic missionaries. These divergent receptions are analyzed based on historical and visual sources, using comparative data to shed light on the representations of slavery, race, and redemption as appraised in Belgium and in Congo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Annals of Theology / Roczniki Teologiczne is the property of Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawla II and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Industrial decline and environmental degradation have left their mark on Butte, Montana, a "black heart" of the American West. Once producing more copper ore than any mine in the world, the mines ceased all operations in 1983. Two years later, a 90-foot tall, 48-foot wide, 51-ton statue of the Virgin Mary, named Our Lady of the Rockies, was airlifted in five massive pieces to her resting place 8,500 feet above sea level, where she now stands guard over the city and the toxic wasteland mining left behind. Our Lady offers a dramatic focal object for Butte's survival in a postindustrial setting. She invites viewers' engagement through seeing and devotion, acting as a sacred site of pilgrimage and credited by many for healing physical ailments and reopening Butte's mining sector. As a material link to the sacred, Our Lady provides believers with a path toward the transcendent and away from the deteriorating industrial city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Among the mosaic of institutions that the Spanish clergy implanted in the New World to spread Christianity, the confraternities or brotherhoods developed an important role as pious and charitable associations under a religious advocation and with a significant participation in urban public life. One of the few musicians’ confraternity known in New Spain was the congregation of Nuestra Señora de la Antigua of Mexico Cathedral, founded by the Peninsular composer Fabián Pérez Ximeno in the 1640s. Based on the information from the constitutions and relevant bibliography, this article examines the foundational context and the functioning of this congregation, as well as the way in which the group of cathedral musicians managed to cohesion professionally and to project its Peninsular identity through Marian devotion.

This article explores the ways in which the newly founded and highly contested Christian confession of the Greek Catholics or Uniates employed strategies of mass mobilization to establish and maintain their position within a contested confessional terrain. The Greek Catholic clerics, above all monks of the Basilian order fostered an active policy of acquiring, founding and promoting Marian places of grace in order to create and invigorate a sense of belonging among their flock. The article argues that folk ideological notions concerning the spatial and physical conditions for the working of miracles were seized upon by the Greek Catholic faithful to establish a mental map of grace of their own. Especially, the Basilian order took particular care to organize mass events (annual pilgrimages, coronation celebrations for miraculous images) and promote Marian devotion through miracle reports and icon songs in an attempt to define what it means to be a Greek Catholic in terms of sacred territoriality.

This article is based on van Kessel's study of La Tirana in Chile in 1970, over a non-representative sample of about one thousand participants including dancers, pilgrims, vendors and tourists. La Tirana is the main Marian sanctuary in the north of Chile. Van Kessel could clearly identify the importance of the religious manda as the main reason of devotion associated with complementary beliefs concerning the Virgin's miraculous efficacy for those who strictly fulfill her. After nearly fifty years, this study finds out that the manda has tended to disappear and that religious attitudes toward the Virgin have changed; especially those related to the specifications of the fulfillment of the religious promise. Although all these changes go along with an increase in ecclesiastical mediation of the sanctuary devotion, it is the pilgrim's educational level that best explains these changes in the religious awareness of Chilean Marianism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper reflects on the meanings of the Flores de Mayo ritual as performed in a town on the southeastern coast of Cebu through the examination of Mary as a “semantically open” symbol. The essay illustrates how ideas about Mary are constructed through the discourse of the Church and are in turn, reinforced through a Church-instituted and regulated ritual. An analysis of selected elements of the ritual however, reveals that the symbol of Mary has the potential to hold “other” kinds of meanings that slip in between “official” and “unofficial” discourses, highlighting how Mary continues to be a negotiated field between church authorities and the popular faithful.

The present article approaches the transformation in the studies on Brazilian shrines based on the Catholic invocation of Our Lady of Conception Aparecida by means of a cultural reflection on Latin America's symbolic space. Considering expressive historical, semiotic and institutional aspects to the analysis of the continent's cultural patrimony, this article acknowledges the emergence of an identification network of religious spaces. Culturally-projected Geography favours the articulate interpretation of symbolic vectors, such as festivities, media, and tourism, facilitating both the comparison between other localities, such as municipalities and shrines, in Brazil and Latin America, as well as the theatrical characterization of devotions in the construction of the continent's patrimony. Summarizing the qualitative verifications made along three years of investigation on the strategies of irradiating Marian devotion, this study has assessed the aesthetic strength of religious patrimony as a challenge to the appreciation of Latinity. This study arrives at the conclusion that the greatest risk to cultural religious patrimony lies in the growth of fundamentalist ideologies, which seek to discredit the legitimacy of the Marian tradition along with its cultural and religious syncretism and continental identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents Marian motives in parish catechesis and pastoral projects in Poland. The importance of the parish and the role of mariology in catechesis were depicted at first. Attention was paid to both the piety aspect and the teaching about Mary. The paper discusses the results of the survey in 26 selected Polish Catholic parishes on the forms of Marian devotion and the participation of children and young people in Marian services (like the rosary, Rorate Mass, pilgrimages to Marian shrines) as well as the Marian profile of parish groups especially for children and young people. The research has shown that parish groups gather only a small percentage of children and young people, while various forms of Marian devotion in parishes enjoy a higher turnout. The analysis has also stressed the importance of a proper preparation of parish communities leaders as far as the Marian aspect of their activity is concerned.