FEMINIZATION OF PILGRIMAGES IN THE CONTEXT OF REVITALIZATION OF RELIGION IN SERBIA

Abstract

Higher religiosity of women, which is often taken as an anthropological and sociological universality in Christianity, in spite of numerous examinations doesn’t seem to deliver some universal explanation. In the context of evident revitalization of religion in Serbia in past twenty years, a need for reexamining a problem emerges: why, if so, are the "frontrunners" of the religious comeback women? Research of the group of believers in Knjaževac (Serbia) reveals that women are more often believers than men, that they are more eager when it comes to religious activities, that they have taken part in many pilgrimage trips, and that the majority of them experienced visions and apparitions. I see and analyze pilgrimages in the light of the rite-of-passage theory - I will examine their communicational aspect, meanings of spiritual conversion, meanings of messages as interpreted by believers, as well as their latent substance. Gender aspects of the experience of pilgrimage will be analyzed in detail based on results of interactive interviews carried out with the group mostly comprising of women. I will also discuss how a group of believers, mostly female, take active part in the life of local church community, and the phenomenon of the vision and the call as a turning point for conversion and activism in renovation of a shrine.