We Only Need the Holy Signs, the Saints are Here Just to Make People Feel at Home

Abstract

This paper on an Umbanda worship space is part of a research with the religions of African and Amerindian matrix, conducted in the years 2015-16 at the request of the 67th Prosecutor’s Office for Human Rights of the State Public Prosecution Service of Mato Grosso do Sul and the Federation of Afro-Brazilian and Amerindian Cults of the State of Mato Grosso do Sul. As requested, several worship spaces were visited and 2 Fathers-of-Saint, 2 Mothers-of-Saint and 1 Babalorishá were interviewed, with the purpose of demonstrating to the municipal authorities that worship space cults should be considered religions, just like the others present in the municipality. Specifically, this paper analyzes the process of re-signification of Catholic saints in Umbanda as part of the hybridization and syncretism of worship space cults. The methodology consisted of visits to several worship spaces, interviews, and specifically in this case, we will analyze this process of re-signification based on the interview with Mother-of-Saint Fátima, coordinator of the Cabocla Janaína Worship Place in Campo Grande. Her speech has shown that the meanings of the Catholic saints in Umbanda, may be to make familiar a religion considered exotic, or even to syncretize the attributes and roles of the saints and orishas.