The Encyclopedia of World Religions

392 S ritual

their experiences there to be different from those in daily life. They can expect to be in close touch with the divine, because the time and place are particularly open or “transparent” to the sacred. Second, the time and place usually also hark back to the great sacred times of the religion, as the Jew ish PASSOVER recalls the EXODUS or the Christian Holy Communion the Last Supper of J ESUS , or in general recalls the times and places of sacred story when the divine presence was strongly felt in the world. Rituals often present what may be called “con densed symbols” of those events, like the ritual bits of bread and wine in Christian Communion, which for believers “trigger” thoughts of the whole story, just as the sight of an old photograph may recall a whole episode in one’s life. Ritual acts can release religious feelings precisely through their routine nature, in that if well practiced and interiorized they come more or less automatically, like dancing or playing the piano when well accomplished, and this can produce an inner reduction of tension and feeling of peace, allowing one’s thoughts and feel ings to move easily to the religious object. Finally, ritual, as a religious act done together, reinforces the cohesion of religious communities, the author ity of the religious leaders performing them, and the institutional structure of the religion making them available. See also SYMBOLISM IN RELIGION . Roman Catholicism One of the three main branches of C HRISTIANITY . The word “catholic” means universal. Roman Catholicism is universal in two senses. It extends around the globe, and more important, it sees itself as the proper bearer of the universal Christian tradition. It is called Roman because it considers the bishop of Rome to be the supreme leader of Christianity. The bishop of Rome is called the Pope ( see PAPACY , THE ). HISTORY For much of the past, the history of Roman Cathol icism is the history of Christianity, then of Chris tianity in western Europe. The Roman Catholic Church—the church of western Europe—did not

Re-inventing Rites of Passage (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000); Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (New York: Aldine de Gruyter, 1995); Arnold van Gennep, The Rites of Passage (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961). ritual The deliberate repetition of conventional and stylized words and actions with special signifi cance. Ritual is very important to religion, where such acts may seem to be meaningless apart from the religious context and interpretation. Ritual may vary from the highly stylized acts of a Vedic rite or the colorful drama of the Eastern Orthodox LITURGY to the simple silence, with a handshake at the end, of a Q UAKER meeting. But it must be realized that virtually all religion, from the most elaborate to the simplest, has ritual in the sense that things are done in a conventional, traditional way, and with words and movements that make no sense apart from the religion. This is as true of a plain Protestant service as of a high mass or an ancient SACRIFICE . It is as true of a highly formal service choreographed like a dance as of an emotional and seemingly spontaneous devotional or Pentecostal type of event, so long as much of it is done—as such things as hymns and hand-rais ing inevitably are—in customary and conventional ways. Even private PRAYERS and MEDITATION are often done ritually, in a customary manner. What kinds of rituals are there and what mes sages do they convey about the divine and about humans and their ways of WORSHIP ? If it is a rich, ancient, formal ritual, it tells us the best way to reach the divine is by getting outside of ourselves through participation in something old, close to our roots, and aesthetically beautiful. If it is free and seemingly spontaneous, it says we get in touch with the divine by losing inhibitions and giving vent to inner feelings. Similar questions about reli gious leadership, symbols, and communities can also be asked about ritual events. Most religious rituals have some features in common. First, they set apart a sacred time and place for the rite. Participants inwardly expect