As formas de expressão devocional antes e ao tempo dos acontecimentos de Fátima

The events that took place in Fatima in 1917 do not present themselves to historiography as isolated or disconnected facts from the dynamics of ecclesial, social and political history. Its understanding calls for the comprehensive framework of Portuguese Catholicism of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as well as requires its relation with the dynamics from across borders. Contextualization, however, needs to go deeper and to focus on the expressions that materialize the religious world view of the time and the protagonists of events. This study falls back on the more factual domain of Fatima to privilege the framework of the religious imaginary, arising from a simple and popular faith, constituted by forms of expression that sought to counteract the dechristianization movement of social life, such as the popular missions and preaching, feasts and processions, pilgrimages and various devotions, as well as the indulged exercises of piety and the reverence for the papacy. It addresses especially the devotional universe of the time, highlighting the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Eucharistic cult, the Immaculate Conception and the Lady of the Rosary, as well as the exemplarity of Saint Joseph.