A Ritual Interrupted: A Case of Contested Ritual Practices in a Q’eqchi’-Maya Catholic Parish

Abstract

Although Q’eqchi’-Maya Mainstream Catholics and Charismatic Catholics in the Guatemala highlands share many of the same physical and social spaces, the relationship between them is a tense one due to their differing modes of ritual practice. Although this conflict rarely comes to a head directly, on one particular occasion a highly ranked member of a Mainstream congregation, and indeed an outspoken critic of the Charismatics, entered the village chapel during the latter’s weekly service and proceeded openly to criticize their ritual practices, leaders’ religious knowledge, and relationship to the larger institutional Catholic Church. This article analyzes this event as a means of furthering our understanding of what happens when unexpected circumstances threaten the integrity of a religious group’s ritual. How do participants try to circumvent, mitigate or otherwise manage such an occurrence? Examining the spoken and embodied actions taken by both the speaker criticizing the congregation and his intended audience sheds light on the interactive strategies each used to manage their social and ethical standing during the uneasy interaction. This article draws critical attention to the way adherents to two related but distinct forms of Christianity establish and contest their modes of religious authority through language, discourse, and bodily behavior. By investigating an episode in which two modes of Christian practice came into direct confrontation with each other, we can better understand how differing ways of being Christian are dialogically constituted.

Keywords:

• Ritual authority
• Catholicism
• Q’eqchi’-Maya
• religious contestation

Acknowledgements

The research upon which this work is based was supported by a Dissertation Fieldwork Grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation (grant number 7143). I would like to thank Hillary Kaell and Jessica Hardin for inviting me to submit this article to the set in this special issue and for encouranging me to develop my thinking about rituals. I also thank the two anonymous reviewers of the Journal of Contemporary Religion for the thoughtful comments which helped me develop the present argument. As always, I owe my biggest debt of gratitude to the people who so graciously shared their time and experiences with me in Cobán. B’antiox eere.

Notes

1. The names of the village, parish, and all individuals are pseudonyms. The name of the city and the diocese to which these belong are accurate. The research was conducted as ethnographic participant observation with parishioners and clergy. I observed and recorded church services on a weekly basis at the parish center and less frequently at several community chapels, participated with lay leaders and clergy in non-ritual parish activities, and conducted both formal and informal interviews with two dozen lay leaders as well as the three priests and four lay staff members who served the parish.

2. My use of this idiosyncratic term is motivated by social conditions in the parish. This majority position is locally unmarked, but understood as distinct from Charismatic Catholics as well as from costumbristas or traditionalist Catholics who more overtly integrate Maya spirituality and Catholicism (and who are not discussed here). I have adopted the term as a means of both highlighting the preeminence of Mainstream Catholicism in San Felipe and rhetorically emphasizing the difference between the two groups. For a detailed discussion of the relationship between different forms of Catholicism in San Felipe, see Hoenes del Pinal, “Ideologies”.

3. Qawa is a formal term of address in Q’eqchi’, roughly equivalent to don in Spanish or ‘Mr.’ in English. Q’eqchi’-Maya men, especially those of high status, are typically addressed as and referred to with the formula of ‘Qawa + [first name]’. In contrast, Q’eqchi-Maya Charismatic Catholics use the formula ‘Hermano (Sp. brother) + [first name]’. These forms of address are emblematic of distinct religious identities and I use them here to highlight this social difference.

4. The saint is an image of Jesus Christ crucified that resides in the southeastern Guatemalan town of Esquipulas and dates to the sixteenth century (Redondo). As the name suggests, Jesus’ skin in this image is a dark mahogany color. The santo is said to have miraculous powers and is venerated throughout Guatemala and abroad (Horst, Thomas and Hunter).

5. This was not the case in the Ladino (i.e. non-indigenous or mestizo) and mixed parishes, where the Charismatic meetings could draw as many people as Mainstream services. At the diocesan level, the CCR was much more strongly integrated into the institutional Church and had the support of Bishop and clergy.

6. These expectations also applied to Mainstream CEBs.

7. In this regard, the Charismatics do not differ greatly from Mainstream parishioners in remote communities, who likewise experience Mass as an infrequent event that punctuates life-stage transitions, rather than as a regularly occurring part of everyday religious life.

8. The full speech, which I captured in both video and audio recordings, runs 13 minutes and 27 seconds. I present only excerpts and a simplified transcription for the sake of clarity.

9. There is something of an irony in that Emanuel’s authority as a catechist comes precisely from his training in biblical exegesis (Hoenes del Pinal, “How” 88).

10. Exceptions to this include Burdick and Cahn.