The Religious Affairs Office

We talk to Manuel Delgado Ruiz (Barcelona, 1956), professor of anthropology at the University of Barcelona. Director of the Exclusion and Social Control Research Group (GRECS), and the Mysticism and Religious Heterodoxy Research Group (GREMHER). Much of his work has been focused on the anthropology of religion, urban anthropology and multiculturalism. He was a member of the Study Group on Immigration at the Catalan Parliament, and is a member of the Generalitat de Catalunya's Advisory Council for Religious Diversity. Mr Delgado is one of the promoters of the 2nd International Symposium on Mysticism and Religious Heterodoxy, which will be taking place on 31 January and 1 to 2 February.

 

• You’re a leading figure in the world of the anthropology of religion. What drew you to this field?

I have to admit that to answer that question I’d need to cast my mind back and have a good think, but mystery is something that’s always appealed to me, and understanding it and uncovering its implications, beyond the strictly religious or mystical realm, was a subject that I found really evocative and seductive. Especially the challenge of doing so from a secular perspective, which is very often difficult to explain in certain circles, including academic ones. I mean how is it that someone who doesn’t have any particularly deep spiritual concerns – or perhaps none at all – should be interested in matters that are systematically associated with irrationality, even with superstition.

It must be said that spiritual people are essentially concerned with seeing the spiritual dimension of the mundane. While others are interested in the mundane dimension of the spiritual. Spirituality leads people to do things that have nothing spiritual about them at all, and this is what we anthropologists of religion are interested in.

• You studied at the École Pratique des Hautes Études (at the Sorbonne in Paris). Why?

I finished my degree, handed in my dissertation, as it was called at the time, and got a scholarship to spend a couple of years as a student at the École Pratique des Hautes Études. I went with Julian Pitt-Rivers. I came into contact with the world of the Hellenists, which revolved around Marcel Detienne, Jean-Pierre Vernant and Pierre Vidal-Naquet. I got even more involved in circles that had to do with religion, but always in a questionable way. Because nowadays it’s difficult to establish clear boundaries separating what is religion from what is not, or the spiritual from the non-spiritual.

The key lies in the following paradox: ideologically, I come from a left wing background. And from an orthodox Marxist point of view, religion is basically a form of ideology. So there’s no difference between approaching a system of ideological representation and a system of religious representation. Why are they perceived as different? Perhaps because of the invocation of more or less eternal, transcendent or supernatural authorities. In my opinion, religion is basically ideology. It doesn’t have any specific characteristic that makes it segregable.

Religious practice used to be clearly institutionalised in the form of the Church, whereas today it’s no longer something (exclusively) mediated by priests, or performed in a particular physical setting. Consequently, religion has become diffuse. As Marx and Engels demonstrated in The German Ideology (1846), every time we try to define the concept of religion, we find it’s impossible to distinguish from that of ideology – I challenge anyone to come up with a definition that doesn’t automatically include any form of non-theologically based conception of the world. And the impossibility of establishing a clear difference between the religious and the non-religious has become even more pronounced now that religion in the traditional sense has been influenced by the expansion (even more ambiguous) of what is termed spirituality. Some of the proponents of what we now call left-wing ideology, such as Marx and Engels, already sensed how difficult it was to separate religion and ideology. So the role of dispensing truth, explaining why we exist and the norms that give value to our existence, roles that had been filled by religious institutions, today have been largely taken over by politicians and social scientists.

• Your dissertation is entitled La ira sagrada. Anticlericalismo, iconoclastia y antirritualismo en la España contemporània [Sacred Anger. Anti-clericalism, Iconoclasm and Anti-ritualism in Modern Spain]. What sparked your interest in this subject?

When I was a student, what was in fashion – because there are fashions in academia – was actually popular culture. And within popular culture, from a Gramscian perspective there was a vindication of popular culture as the culture of subaltern groups. Within that field, one of the areas was that of popular religiosity. And I was interested, because from a Gramscian viewpoint, emancipatory elements could be revealed as forms of piety that could certainly be associated with superstition. However, seen under the Gramscian microscope they were a way of expressing the thoughts, the state of mind, and the will of the powerless.

Consequently, when I realised what some of the characteristics of popular religiosity had been, what I discovered was that it had very often been phobic. That’s to say that people were not only dedicated to parading with statues of the Virgin Mary, and carrying images of the saints up and down from a hermitage; but were also repeatedly involved, systematically and almost obsessively, with burning them or dragging them through the streets. In this way they became victims of all kinds of obscenities. I was intrigued by how violence played such an important role in that popular religiosity.

• What remains of that anti-clericalism today? How do you perceive the way religion is viewed in Barcelona today?

The struggle I was talking about needs to be analysed; we need to show that it’s possible to discuss phenomena classified as religious seriously, in a reasoned and rigorous way, but starting out from the premise that we are dealing with what may be a somewhat spurious belief – that such phenomena really can be segregated, set apart and considered exempt, separate from the non-religious, which is supposedly secular, rational, and enlightened. Basically, the difficulty lies in the fact that the only people who pay any attention to you tend to be people who are sensitive or spiritual. However, when public administrations are underpinned by a left-wing ideology, interest in religious matters is non-existent.

The paradox is that in principle we assumed that secularisation would lead to a ‘deactivation’ of the sacred; yet what we find is a new multi-faceted religiosity where the point of reference, the canon, is the individual themselves. Religion, which used to be something we assumed could be defined as a sort of fixed point, has ended up becoming more fragmented, permeating everything, as if it were a kind of magma. This is the problem faced by the institutions: finding people to take part in the conversation. Secularisation was intended to guarantee religious pluralism, to put an end to the absolute power of the Catholic Church, and paradoxical though it may seem, to impose freedom. But it’s also important to remember that apart from being a way of connecting with the transcendent, religions serve many other purposes. It’s these other purposes, these other things that religions do that interest us anthropologists, but institutions, restricted as they are by the definition of religion as belief, fail to understand this other dimension, which is not at all transcendental.

At the moment there is a significant section of society – progressive, left wing – that is utterly impervious to any idea that might make them see that this is a facet of religion that cannot be underestimated. Basically, the problem is that these people on the left who believe that they are in a position to scorn the spiritual and the religious don’t realise to what extent their disdain stems from the fact that they are on the inside, and not on the outside as they claim to be. Because the problem is basically one of competence. Because today, it’s this progressive left-wing thinking that has become more and more “spiritual, religious, mystical, soteriological”, to the extent that all that’s left of a kind of critical-materialistic reflection is the wreckage. Everyone has turned religious.

Today, left-wing intellectuals are basically “chaplains”, that is basically they impart lessons on morality. For example, I sit on the Generalitat de Catalunya’s Advisory Council for Religious Diversity, and now it’s the stance of atheists I’m defending at the debating table. Because we too have to be included in the discussion. Furthermore, at the moment the difficulty lies in the fact that the problem isn’t the dialogue between religions, but rather the dialogue between people who believe themselves to be religious, and people who do not believe themselves to be religious. Primarily because the non-believers in effect have stronger beliefs than the believers do. And also because we live in a country where most believers aren’t practising believers, and most of those who do practice, don’t believe.

So when the Advisory Council gives a place to a person who declares themselves to be a materialist in the classical sense of the word, it’s a good thing. Because I truly believe that the issue that’s problematic in terms of interreligious dialogue isn’t one of dialogue between religions. It’s basically that the dialogue takes place in a supposedly segregated space. Basically it’s the triumph of the old idealism that Marx was so critical of, that is the idea that people behave in accordance with their faith, beliefs or convictions. Suddenly, people’s real living conditions, which are what determine their beliefs, their faith, and their convictions count for nothing. Everything is spiritual.

• How do you personally think the anthropology of religion has evolved in recent years? Which approaches and themes have changed?

This very week we’ve been involved in preparations for the 2nd International Symposium on Mysticism and Religious Heterodoxy with the aim of recovering the remains of other shipwrecks, I mean those sub-currents and sub-disciplines, like the anthropology of religion for example. The anthropology of religion has disappeared from public policy. And if it does return, that will be because we and Maria del Mar Griera of the ISOR (Research in Sociology of Religion) have put it back on the agenda. A tough fight. It’s very clear that religious anthropology isn’t in the best of health.

The golden age of religious anthropology was the time of Josefina Roma, Joan Prat, etc. When I started out in religious anthropology it did indeed have a space, and a certain weight. I worked in three areas of the discipline, anthropology linked to the theme of multiculturalism, religious anthropology and urban anthropology. These three areas have practically disappeared. I’d like to be able to tell you what they’ve been replaced with, but I don’t really know. I think anthropology has ended up adopting a cryptic language (quite a soteriological one by the way), in which it’s almost impossible to know what’s actually being discussed. What has survived is the anthropology of spiritualities, and we don’t know exactly what that is or what it might consist of either.

An area like the anthropology, that claims to be a more or less recognisable – albeit debatable – field, has practically vanished. And our job is to revive it.

• What inspired the foundation of GRECS, the Exclusion and Social Control Research Group? What does it study?

I’d like to be able to say when I arrived that was all settled, but it wasn’t. GRECS is almost 25 years old. It started with an urban themed project in Latin America. Over time, GRECS has become an umbrella for a series of very prolific research and work groups. Essentially I’d define it as a sort of repository of initiatives grouped into research groups working in different fields, such as gender, urban issues, religion, art, etc. What’s more, not only are there new groups constantly being created, but also new groups breaking away. These are groups that started out with GRECS, and are now have independent lives of their own. This is my greatest source of satisfaction. In my opinion, the huge success of GRECS has been precisely that not only does it protect and support group initiatives, but also that some of them grow in one way or another, and off they go.

• How did the Mysticism and Religious Heterodoxy Research Group GREMHER come about? Your interest has been focused on more heterodox religious practices rather than on the great religions. Why?

First of all, I have to say that GREMHER is concerned with the subject of heterodox religious practices, and I’d like to highlight this. What isn’t currently in fashion is precisely a ‘normality’, an orthodoxy. Heterodoxy is the most common theme today, and it’s linked to the fact that there’s a dissolution, a dispersion, an explosion of spirituality, of religion, and so on. For example, one of our theses is ’Anaïs Madera’s, which is on Paganism (1). These Pagan groups quite rightly demand to be considered a religion.

For the time being, no one can claim orthodoxy within their own religious denomination, like, for example, the Church. Which means that everyone has good reason to consider themselves heterodox.

• What issues are currently being worked on at GREMHER?

A lot! There are several theses in progress, on Neo-Druidism, the Seventh Day Adventist Church, the Young Christian Workers (YCW), los círculos de mujeres (women’s circles, feminist spirituality), and also on apparitions in a restaurant in Girona. The latter is in the same vein as Sibila Vigna’s thesis on apparitions at a theatre in Salto (Uruguay), which won an extraordinary doctorate award and has now been published by the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC): Etnografías extraordinarias: gentes, espíritus y asombros en Salto, Uruguay [Extraordinary Ethnographies: People, Spirits and Wonders in Salto, Uruguay] (2).

Specifically on this subject, I would like to point out that if there is indeed something we might call religion, it would be communication with the invisible. That’s to say that there is a world, a society of palpable things. And there’s one that’s there, but that can’t be seen or touched. In this case, obviously the world of ghosts, the spirit world. This connects with one of GREMHER’s pioneering works, one that has to do not with ghosts but with beings that survive death, and is a magnificent piece of work by Gerard Horta, L’espiritisme català, 1861-1899 [Catalan Spiritualism, 1861-1899]. Belief in ghosts and spiritualism does not proclaim the supernatural nature of such phenomena, because these are understood to be part of the material world; as the surrealists say, “there is another world, and it is this one”. What clearer example could there be than that a form of communication with the ethereal can claim to be materialistic? Because it’s not another world that they come from. It’s this one, but you don’t see them.

What constitutes our pride, our heritage, when working with little recognised subjects, are precisely these extraordinary doctorate or master’s prizes such as those awarded to Sibila Vigna and Anaïs Madera.

• How do you see the future of the discipline of the anthropology of religion?

This week we’re starting a symposium on new rites and new festivals, and we’ve also been given a RELIG research grant by the Generalitat de Catalunya. Personally, I believe that these things will leave a legacy. And what’s more there’s Maria del Mar Griera at the ISOR (Research in Sociology of Religion) research group, who I believe will take up that legacy within the department if no-one else does, at least in formal, administrative terms; but I hope that she’ll take the task on academically. I have to say that the symposium is a meeting point between GREMHER and ISOR aimed at keeping the record straight, to sustain and provide continuity. We previously held an international meeting that brought together people working in the field of the social sciences of religion, the sociology of religion – although sociology is not the same as anthropology. This tremendously volatile, unstable, fluctuating and outdated idea of the religious is more difficult for people working in the field of sociology. There are two perspectives to work on.

I certainly believe that we’re overcoming this neglect, and we need to successfully rebuild a space for the discipline of the anthropology of religion within the academic world. For those dedicated to the subject, the highest achievement we can aspire to is that our ideas are taken up by others. What I myself am doing is imitate what I learned from Joan Prat. My ideas, the best of my ideas, are his. Likewise, I hope that there will be someone to follow me; in the administrative sense that is, I’m not planning to drop dead right away, but I will be retiring at some point. I hope there’ someone who, in one way or another, will take up my ideas – which will be theirs, and that I’ll see myself reflected in them.

• And lastly, tell me about the 2nd International Symposium on Mysticism and Religious Heterodoxy. What would you highlight? And who are the most outstanding contributors?

In terms of the symposium, in effect it’s the formal summary, in the sense of initiatives, activities, and meetings of what I’m talking to you about. In practice, seeing how successful, it is in terms of communicants and registrations, I think we’ll be able to bring together, some of the best minds in the social sciences of religion, in both sociology and anthropology, duly mixed up in a happily promiscuous way. I think most of us who work in these areas will be there. And we’ll be addressing a range of topics, some of which it would be difficult to fit into the sphere of religion. And we want to show, through discussion, dialogue and the sharing of research and theory, that religion, far from the death sentence to which it was condemned by secularisation, has in fact ended up expanding, becoming more diffuse, and has now spread into every nook and cranny of society. There’s no longer any escape from this kind of generalisation, this metastasis of the religious: it’s everywhere today. Instead of being relegated to the private sphere, which theoretically is where it should be, everything has ended up becoming spiritual.

There are many people involved, a great many. I think the fact that Maria del Mar Griera, Mónica Cornejo, and Manuela Cantón Delgado will be there, and that William Christian and others will be back (Joan Prat can’t make it for health reasons) means that leading figures will be there – people who provide a better point of reference than me, because frankly I have doubts about how to define religion. They do have absolute clarity regarding a definition. For example, the crossover between what is quackery and what is holistic medicine, which they end up defending as legitimate practice, both appropriate and spiritual. One of the most interesting issues, and there will be several round tables focused on it, is gender. Because it’s no coincidence that these practices, quackery and alternative medicine, have been in female hands. There are several tables that will be talking about this. There’s one that will be discussing popular Catholic religiosity from a gender perspective. Why? Because religion is a victim of a kind of curse or misunderstanding, that implied that its superstitious nature made it particularly attractive to weak-minded people. For example, women. This is what explains, for example, the issue of anti-clericalism, the left’s rejection of women’s suffrage, the Woman of the Republic, and so on. The only thing that could explain why women were more religious than men was that it was inevitably an inherent part of their mental weakness. Women didn’t know how to think for themselves. And so it was easy for the Church to manipulate them. In other words, the idea that religion manipulates women, and that women are attracted to the religious or spiritual, as a consequence of what might be called their “natural” condition as women, is clearly no longer a sexist premise, but a misogynistic one.

Several symposia have shown that this area of superstition, of the cultural backwardness so often associated with religion, could have been, has systematically been, an area in which women have been able to develop their own specific forms of association, even been able to resist, empowering themselves in relation to the family, for example. That women met for their own reasons, to talk about a realm not accepted by the rational world, implies understanding that they had a different form of rationality, and that they used the religious space – and are still using it today. For example, this is reflected in the work of Oriol Pascual’s Santet de Poblenou (3).

I believe that this approach, this sort of focus, can provide a positive contribution in line with the document on “Religious Traditions and Gender Equity” that’s being prepared by the Advisory Council for Religious Diversity.

The issue, in general, is one that’s often discussed, and always comes up at some point. But the fact that it appears in relation to religion and not to alert us to some kind of mental deficiency, is something I think we’ll be very sure to make clear at the symposium.

 

(1) Final masters project: El retorno de los druidas. Aproximación etnográfica a la (re)construcción y la reivindicación religiosa del druidismo contemporáneo desde la Hermandad Druida Dún Ailline.

(2) Sibila Vigna (2020). Etnografías extraordinarias: gentes, espíritus y asombros en Salto, Uruguay. Library of Anthropology. Madrid: CSIC, Ministry for Science and Innovation, Spain.

(3) Thesis: Has vist l’esquerda per a tirar los desitjos?: estudi antropològic d’un altar popular. El cas del Santet de Poblenou de Barcelona.