ABSTRACT
Travel for religious and/or spiritual reasons has long been a motivator for human mobility. When compared to other tourism niche markets, such as ecotourism, heritage tourism, and cultural tourism, religious and spiritual tourism have been relatively understudied until recently. The shutting down of religious mass gatherings by government and health authorities in 2020 led to different reactions by faith communities, some positive and some negative. While the short- and long-term future of tourism more generally is uncertain, religious and spiritual tourism are thought to be one of the first tourism markets to rebound post COVID-19, particularly regionally, considering the importance of sacred places within the context of salvation and the search for meaning in an uncertain world. This chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book.
