The Poetic Uses of Religion inThe Miraculous Day of Amalia Gómez

Abstract

It is surprising that so few historians of religions have ever tried to interpret a literary work from their own perspective.—Mircea EliadeThere are no gospels that are immortal, but neither is there any reason for believing that humanity is incapable of inventing new ones.—Emile DurkheimWas that what God expected, that ritual of more pain? She thought of Milagros. Add this to all her miseries? Milagros yearned for less pain… . Was the old woman in veils courting something more with her crawling on bloodied knees—a miracle—by displaying her endurance for greater misery?—John RechyThe past thirty years have been a watershed in Mexican American literature, witnessing the proliferation of texts with increasingly diverse themes. For the most part, this literary production has been motivated by the impulse to narrate the stories that typify Mexican cultural history in the United States.

Ritual, Stories, and the Poetics of a Journey Home Among Latino Catholics

“…Religious devotees have drawn upon religious symbols, in particular Our Lady of Guadalupe, to critique and resist colonial and postcolonial conditions and advance ethical objectives, including ethnic identification and equality between genders and across populations 9 . In some instances, Luis León shows, devotees undertake unorthodox practices, especially in times of negligible official, institutional support, to redirect beliefs and cope with the hardships of barrio life, allaying fears, mitigating pain, and providing hope in the future (1999, 2004). Gracie's enactment of the rosary in stories brings to the surface an amalgamation of this tradition, including its dramatic components, and a sensuous, subliminal orientation; the enactment refers to the coincidence of the performance and otherness—human, sacred, and a priori to political consciousness and alternative ways of being‐in‐the‐world.…”

“…Díaz‐Stevens (1998) and Isasi‐Díaz (1993, 1995, 2004) show how religious poetics articulate the ethic of social equity between genders and across populations. Carrasco (1982), Davalos (2002), Isasi‐Díaz (1993, 2004), Nabhan‐Warren (2005) and León (1999, 2004) show how this ethic of social equity shapes social and political negotiations of space—geographical and discursive—and of expressive culture, including the work of novelists and Marian visionaries, to change society.…”