When I was a missionary with the Anglican Church, we prided ourselves on having a “rational” faith. Now, rational did not mean that there were no mystical elements to what we believed. Neither did it mean that we had figured out all mysteries. Neither did it mean that we had no traditions, rather we prided ourselves on our traditions. Rather, it meant that as we practiced the faith, we could explain where all the bits and bobs of our faith came from. We knew that our white tunic was a descendant of the Roman toga. We knew that the chasuble was a descendant of a Roman outer cloak. In Latin America it fit in very well, since the serape or poncho were still in common use among many of the people in the countryside.
Both us, and other missionaries, poked fun at the popular religiosity of the Roman Catholic population. In particular, the Baptists considered them to be superstitions, or, even worse, syncretism with the local pre-Christian pagan culture. We, of course, may have traditions, but not superstitions. In all this, we did not notice our popular religiosity. It showed in things like celebrating Thanskgiving Day, even though we were in a country in which that day did not exist. It showed in the way in which we ran our churches. We came from a highly egalitarian country and so we tried to have everything done in our style of committee work. Village elders do not exist in our culture anymore, so, some among the USA missionaries wanted board members elected, rather than using the already existing village elders.
Needless to say, since Christianity has a long history in Latin America, the local populace was able to see all our popular religiosity. Frankly, the local populace in many of the villages truly needed evangelizing. Much of medieval-style Catholicism (in the negative sense) still existed. In the Quechua village in which I worked, the Catholic priest came maybe once or twice a year. Most of the year, libations were poured out to Pachamama, the earth goddess, and I suspect that a llama or two was sacrificed periodically, though it never happened in my sight and I was careful not to ask so that I would not be drawn into a discussion of llama sacrifice before they had some understanding of who I was and what I represented. Nevertheless, they recognized the aspects of our Christianity which were merely American culture baptized.
And, this is the problem with popular religiosity. Often, we do not recognize it as popular religiosity, as the way in which Christianity has adapted itself to our culture. Rather, we think of it as part of the faith. It is only if we are fortunate enough to travel to another country, to a congregation which we recognize as being fully Christian, and see the practices in that congregation that we begin to see, as in a mirror, our popular religiosity. When I was in the Army, I was fortunate to meet a retired Navy Captain at the church I was attending in Georgia. He commented in one of our Sunday School classes of the shock that he felt when he was in Germany and met some German Baptists who believed just like he did in terms of salvation, but, uhm, but, ssshhhhhh, drank beer. It shook him to the core because he had been raised in the South of the USA to believe that it was non-Christian to drink. So he checked and, even worse, found out that the denomination had no anti-drinking rule. It was the beginning of his seeing, as in a mirror, which parts of what he took to be inviolable parts of his faith were actually popular religiosity.
In fact, official and popular religiosity are interwoven in every expression of religion on this planet. This does not mean that they are full of superstitions. It does not mean that we go on a witch hunt to try to root out popular religiosity. It does not mean that popular religiosity, per se, is to be looked down upon. Rather, it does mean that there is no way for a human being to express his/her beliefs in a practical way without those expressions being held in a wineskin from the culture in which he/she lives. And, that wineskin is necessary for the religion to have a shape and a definition that will let it grow in that culture. Most people will not be aware of the cultural wineskin in which their religion is held. But, it is there. It is potent. It is necessary.
===MORE TO COME===
well said. it reminds me of the brilliant little book by catholic missionary to the masai, vincent donovan: http://is.gd/BFeF as an outsider coming in, it forced him to question just about everything that he had assumed including leadership, communion and jesus’ parables.
as you say, sometimes the only way to notice what is purely cultural is to step out of our own culture and into another one.