ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by discussing the most apparent sensory effect, that of visual imagery, exploring the sources of the Franciscan images on the altar of the Santuario and the purposes they have served for worshippers in the Santuario. The Santuario is a small church built of adobe bricks in the Hispanic village of Chimayo in northern New Mexico. The chapter is concerned with several related aspects of the role of the Franciscans in establishing and promoting the Santuario in the early nineteenth century and their at times complex engagement with the beliefs and practices of local Hispanic and Indian people in the area. At Santuario, as at Esquipulas, Guatemala, use of the healing earth further engaged the senses, for it was rubbed on the skin to cure some ailments, and it was dissolved in water and drunk to cure others. Pilgrimage transformed the more-or-less sedentary spiritual life of parishioner to an active form of worship that deeply involved the senses.
