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The women (and men) draw their daily practice from a set of appropriate actions, all of which are called puja. Improvization is framed by the appropriate sentiment of devotion, and the women use teaching puja and discussions of daily puja to explain the relationship between right action and intention. There are specific faults or sins that mark when the worshipper is ’getting it wrong’ and are considered a sign of the wrong religious sentiment. Despite orthodox arguments to the contrary, personal hymn repertoires express a belief in the Jinas’ grace and compassion for the devotees and reflect a personal style within the range of acceptable acts and beliefs.

A note is always seen at the beginning of all the spiritual biographies written about Ānandamayī Mā to express how the author apologizes for situations wherein the reader may arrive at misunderstandings about Mā's life. The authors of such biographies feel that it is their responsibility to share information regarding Mā and her life so that the readers may come to realize Mā's greatness and even experience bliss. Thoroughly analysing the life story of Ānandamayī Mā provides the opportunity to examine the sacred biography of someone who lived in a relatively contemporary setting. This chapter looks into the different parts of Mā's life as told by her devotees, in order to demonstrate how Mā interacted with her devotees and how this impacted the devotees' lives.

As we have established that Ānandamayī Mā is recognized by her devotees as an embodiment of God, the need to ask the following questions arises: How does having a personal relationship with God in a woman's body affect Mā's devotees, especially the women? Does this sort of relationship empower women? Viewing Mā as a gender-related symbol may be characterized by several different meanings, making it essential to have an understanding about gender in the context of Hindu culture and how this is linked with following the spiritual path. This chapter looks into how Mā relates gender, or the blindness to it, to spiritual life, through presenting information obtained from the author's interviews with 12 of Mā's women devotees.

This chapter reexamines the centrality of the cult of saints in Islamic and Jewish traditions in the light of recent research concerning popular and high culture. Neither the traditional dichotomy of high and low culture, nor a fluid model, as previously proposed, sufficiently considers the language writers employed and the nature of the rituals devotees performed. Rather, the discussion holds that so long as devotees entered a sacred space and engaged in the sacred by participating in devotional acts or in public processions and rituals, they no longer existed at the margins. The chapter concludes that Jews, Muslims, and Christians shared sacred places and undertook sacred journeys together.

This introductory chapter begins with the story behind this book's author's decision to study Santa Muerte. Specifically, the chapter attempts to explain why in only ten years devotion to Santa Muerte has transformed from an occult practice, unknown to most Mexicans, to a burgeoning public cult that counts millions of devotees in Mexico and the United States among its followers. The chapter then briefly introduces Santa Muerte to those who have not encountered her before. It offers a profile of the devotees of Saint Death to shed light on her tremendous popularity. It also discusses Santa Muerte's special appeal to assailants and others who live on the margins of Mexican and American law.

This chapter discusses the history and origins of the cult of Saint Death. It examines who she is and how she became what she is today in the early years of the 21st century. In looking at her past, both myth and reality in the development of her cult are considered. A small minority of more sophisticated cult members are interested in the history of their beloved saint and have well-defined views on the matter. Others, who are not believers themselves, have embraced Santa Muerte and often death itself as an icon of Mexicanness and spun their own interesting stories about the origins of her devotion. It is shown that the myths surrounding the cult are often just as revealing as the reality and tell us much about the nature of the cult.

The astonishing growth of the Santa Muerte cult over the past decade has resulted in millions of new devotees who are neither jilted lovers nor traffickers of narcotics and stimulants. The new flock of faithful is a heterogeneous group with diverse afflictions and aspirations. To meet the various needs of her diverse devotional base, the Powerful Lady has abandoned her narrow specialization in matters of love and passion for the new role of an omnipotent generalist whose range of operation is probably greater than that of any other spiritual rival, including the Virgin of Guadalupe and Jesus. In looking at her complex new identity on the Mexican and American religious landscapes, this chapter focuses on how devotees conceive of her, while the views of nonbelievers will also be taken into account.

Very few media reports and films show anything but the dark side of the cult of Santa Muerte. Most American and Mexican nonbelievers, for example, have little idea that the Skinny Lady heals sickness, finds employment, and helps alcoholics and drug addicts in their struggles for sobriety. This chapter, however, focuses on the decidedly non-Christian and often amoral Santa Muerte who is asked to perform all sorts of dark deeds. It describes how Saint Death has become the patroness of the drug war. In other words, her devotion among the police, soldiers, and prison guards, those on the front lines of the Mexican government's war against the cartels, seems as widespread as it is among the traffickers they are fighting.

This chapter considers the skeleton saint's roles as love doctor and bounty hunter of wayward men. It is here that her gender identity is most interesting, as in this she mostly attends to the desires and afflictions of female devotees. The ritual practices associated with the crimson candle are discussed.

This chapter focuses on the devotion to Santa Muerte's as a patron saint of prosperity and abundance. It describes how Saint Death not only brought prosperity to true believers but also to those who traffic in her merchandise and services, many of whom are not devotees themselves. It discusses the ritual practices associated with the golden candle; the various ways devotees sport the image of Saint Death' to proclaim their faith; and depictions of Saint Death in devotional literature, the Internet, television, and music.

This chapter discusses Santa Muerte's role as healer. Drawing on both European and Mexican cultural antecedents in which death possesses awesome curing powers and tapping into the well-established tradition of saints (both canonized and folk) who heal through faith, Santa Muerte in just a decade has become one of the greatest healers on the Mexican religious landscape. But judging by the small number of purple votive candles at her altars and shrines, one would surmise that miracles of restored health do not figure as an important part of the cult.

One of the main points of this book is that Santa Muerte is a multifaceted popular saint, composed of many different colors. It has examined the polychromatic saint in her full range of colors. This chapter now reconsiders the rainbow of colors that come together to form her powerful seven-color votive candle. Many devotees seek miracles on several fronts, especially in the socioeconomic context of extreme violence and financial hardship, and Santa Muerte of the seven powers (as the candle is also known) is the ultimate supernatural multitasker, who can act simultaneously on several different petitions. The demand for miracles on multiple fronts is reflected in the strong sales of this newest candle of the cult. It vies with the gold one for the top spot among the nontraditional colors (the traditional being red, white, and black).

This chapter moves to questions of labor. It explores how the differing agendas of the various imaginations about Tamil come into play in public policies and politics. It tracks the many dilemmas that trouble its devotees as they translate their “talk” of tamilpparru into tamilppani, “service” and “work” for Tamil.

This chapter turns to the lives and stories of Tamil devotees, which are offered as models of emulation for all good and loyal Tamil speakers. It aims to chart the production of the “devotional subject,” an entity wrought in the cauldron of Tamil devotionalism whose history is the story of the language, and whose life cannot be imagined independently of Tamil. At the turn of the new century, the devotional subject is one among a large number of possible subject-positions occupied by speakers of Tamil.

This chapter explores the question of whether the Goddess is a feminist. It states that it depends on how the term feminist is defined. Various Hindu and Buddhist goddesses could be shown to be either feminists or nonfeminists in their traditional manifestations. But, in the long run, if the Goddess's devotees are feminists, then the Goddess will either come to be seen as a feminist or be abandoned by her feminist devotees. And if the Goddess's devotees are antifeminist or nonfeminist, then the Goddess will not be a feminist, whatever her appearance to outsiders who might find her appearance inspiring to their own feminism. Thus, the answer to this question lies not in the imagery and mythology of the Goddess, but in a complex and subtle interaction between the Goddess and her devotees.

Contrary to popular belief, cults have attracted not the lonely and lost, but rather the idealistic and lofty minded, the curious and well educated. Through arriving at an understanding of the pushes and pulls of such a commitment, the reasons can be deconstructed. This chapter presents some of the main features of comparison between Heaven's Gate and the DWP, reiterating the significance of social context and social structure. The comparison illuminates the parallels in the two groups and the extent to which cultic influences operated to transform at least some of the members from devotees to true believers. The DWP and Heaven's Gate evolved out of two quite different social phenomena, yet similar governing principles or themes emerged in both of these broad social movements. Everything in these two groups fitted together like a three-dimensional puzzle. Inside each group, very little happened by chance. Even outside events were interpreted to coincide with the group's worldview, including the reframing, or reinterpretation, of leaders' and members' personal lives to fit the ideology. Conclusions regarding membership, commitment, charisma, leadership, and the nature of cultic, or self-sealing, social systems are drawn.

Although their rights are protected, the original people have recently intermingled with immigrants in most aspects of life. Over time their distinctive identity has faded as they, and the immigrants, have increasingly blended into the Hong Kong population. The construction of the MTR line, although profoundly disruptive, connected Tsuen Wan to urban Hong Kong and the new airport. The central Tianhou temple was directly affected, but was preserved, and continues to be managed by the Rural Committee, although many immigrants worship there, especially Teochiu women devotees. In Kwan Mun Hau, although many members now live elsewhere, the lineages have remained strong, and the village united, as evidenced by a special ceremony and banquet on the day before retrocession. Their level of education and quality of life have greatly increased.

This concluding chapter reiterates how Prince Shōtoku, as the focus of a widespread transsectarian cult, integrated into his person diverse times and places, thereby symbolically overcoming a sense of distance from sources of Buddhist authority. The implications of that figuration were worked out in the variegated facets of his identity that were scattered throughout the country in medieval times. Devotees inscribed Shōtoku's sacred story onto the landscape of what was once perceived as the political and religious periphery within Japan. Thus, competing religious communities used visual arts to promote their own maps through which they asserted their unique relationship to the prince and their core position in new sacred worlds they imagined.

This concluding chapter describes how new media can facilitate novel connections that enable innovative cultural prospects. The studied topics—cantors, ecumenical broadcasts, public works of Holocaust remembrance, hybridized December holiday, and followers’ commitment to a charismatic religious leader—show that a new cultural midpoint between new media and religion emerges, and is perceived not as unsatisfactory compromise, illegitimate syncretism, a state of impurity, or being lost between two worlds, but rather as hybrid, protean, revelatory. From this perspective, the affinity of religious life and media practices can be best appreciated by the religious skeptic and media detractor as well as by the devotee.