Um santo do povo : o mito Sinhozinho e a religiosidade popular sul- mato-grossense

Abstract

The following research starts from a descriptive-analytical analysis about Sinhozinho tra- jectory between the 1940-2018 periods. The object under study is constructed as a local reli- gious and cultural phenomenon popularized to be re-signified in mythical existence through

the religious cult experienced in the municipality of Bonito, located in the state of Mato

Grosso do Sul. It is proposed a study adhered to the interdisciplinary field and cultural his- tory, analyzing the categories of imaginary and myth through an approach of popular religi- osity. The historical experience of this subject who is not revealed by name, origin or pas- sages in the territory has been manifested among his community followers since the 1940s.

The problem that permeates this discussion, seeks to understand how the Sinhozinho myth is worshiped among the population. Bonito and the Catholic Church. With this questioning, it

is noted that the same subject is constructed as a saint and sensitized in the voice of his com- panions of faith by being eyewitnesses and witnesses of their existence, they are devotees

who continue to reinforce the essence of their belief to be reworked and experienced in the present tense in the mental universe. Thus, it stands out with the hypothesis of this holiness,

the places in which they promote a construction of meaning in the collective and sacred men- tality in the descriptions of local narrators, emitting in their reports the image of a miraculous

saint, sacralized with the interpretation of a divine master. and with their own characteristics

of supernaturality, beyond their appearance, religious gifts, daily involvement with the peo- ple and their miracles among the faithful. The focus of this dissertation is to elucidate its

mental representativeness as something subjective that is extracted from orality. The remi- niscences and reflections that produce other meanings of their physical existence transfigur- ing to the symbolic field in the city, surpass a reflection that is purely religious in the territory

during the processes. of the New State (1937-1945), the Getúlio Vargas National Guard, and the flow of territorial migration. In this context, migrant families from Rio Grande do Sul and Paraguay merged to fragment the locality with their traditional customs and rivalries in

reorienting the cultural ramifications of the locality. The culture of devotion in the expres- siveness of the groups influences the ritual of pilgrimage in the Sinhozinho chapel, identify- ing objects as signs and symbols present in popular religion.