Abstract

Religious tattooing has evolved from ritual to profession. Tattoo artists, by materializing beliefs, experience the tension between art and spirituality. This study examines how tattoo parlors have become spaces where contemporary religious expression is shaped, exploring the intersections between art, spirituality and commerce.

Keywords: religious images, lived religiosity, tattoo

the (religious) craft of tattooing

Religious tattooing has evolved from a ritual to a profession. By materializing beliefs, tattooists experience the tension between art and spirituality. This study examines how tattoo parlors have become a space where contemporary religious expression is configured, exploring the intersections between art, spirituality, and trade.

Keywords: tattoo, religious icons, lived religion, Catholicism.

Presentation

Most studies of the sociology of religion in the Western world have ignored religious tattoos. Yet there are records of religious tattoos since the beginning of the common era. Why this exclusion?

The objectives of this study are, on the one hand, to explore tattoos as religious practices in Western Christian contexts and, on the other hand, to highlight distinct modes of practicing religion ignored by the academy.

This research project, initiated in 2018, has generated a book, four academic articles, three articles in preparation, a semester elective course, the collaboration of colleagues in the United States, Mexico and Argentina; the work of one PhD student and 17 undergraduate students, presentations at academic conferences and numerous publications and interventions in the media, in Spanish and English.

The videos presented here are the result of this study.

Justification

Because the sociology of religion continues to explore religion with a set of institutionally sanctioned practices in the North Atlantic (church attendance, Scripture reading, personal prayer), it neglects the religious value of practices that people consider religious in other cultural contexts (Bender et al., 2013). Tattoos are an example of these neglected practices, even though they have been present in almost every culture for as long as we have records.

The sociology of religion saw religious tattoos in the West as a curiosity, but not as a practice worthy of study. They were a matter of non-Western cultures and therefore anthropological material (Rubin, 1988). It was assumed that since the major Christian churches forbade tattoos, they were alien to the Western religious tradition.

The alleged religious prohibition

Many sociologists assumed that Judeo-Christian scriptures prohibited tattoos (e.g. Bell, 1999; Boudreau, Ferro Higuera and Villamar Ruelas, 2020; Ebensten, 1954; Falk, 1995; Gilbert, 2000; Govenar, 1988; Perez Fonseca, 2009; Rosenblatt, 1997; Sizer, 2020). The most commonly used argument is the quotation of the biblical book Leviticus 19:28, which forbids them (Kluger, 2021). Supposedly, that proscription is later supported by the Christian Roman emperor Constantine I, with the argument that tattoos denigrated the image of God (Brain, 1979; Sanders and Vail, 2008). The Second Council of Nicea (787) would have confirmed this prohibition (Falk, 1995; Gilbert, 2000; Steward, 1990).

It is true that there are numerous testimonies of Christian leaders opposing tattooing: for example, St. Basil in 450 (Petkoff, 2019), the Anglican pastor John Bulwer in the century xvii (Schildkrout, 2004) and the Baptist pastor Paul Chappell in the xx (Parnell, 2019). However, that is not the same as banning a religious tradition.

First, there are biblical references that not only recognize tattoos (Revelation 17:5; Song of Songs 8:6) but attribute to them a protective power (Genesis 4:5). Moreover, other biblical texts are read as encouraging their practice (Isaiah 44:5). One passage (Galatians 6:17) even seems to indicate that the apostle Paul himself had a cross tattooed on him.

Second, a decree by Emperor Constantine banned tattoos on the face, a common punishment in the Roman Empire, because facial tattoos were humiliating: they denigrated the image of God in people. Instead, he argued, enslaved people could tattoo their arms and legs (Bruna, 2005; Gustafson, 2000; Jones, 2000; Steward, 1990).

Third, the Council of Nicaea, held in 787, did not ban tattoos (Price, 2018). The records reflect the controversy over religious images in general, a dispute that shook Christianity in those times. The tension was between the iconoclasts, who rejected images as a legitimate form of representation of the divine, and the iconophiles who defended them. The council affirmed that images should be venerated, not worshipped (Barber, 1999).

The controversy did not end there and many of the following Byzantine emperors supported the iconoclasts. Some even punished the iconophiles by tattooing them on their faces (Gustafson, 2000; Jones, 2000). That same year (787), a local council held in Northumberland, England, banned pagan-motivated tattoos, but praised those depicting Christian iconography (MacQuarrie, 2000; Scheinfeld, 2007).

Fourth, in the case of the Catholic tradition, no prohibition was found in the Code of Canon Law or in the sources of Catholic dogma (Denzinger, 1957). Although among Protestant churches there are some pamphlets and homilies by pastors condemning tattoos, there is no institutional prohibition. Even when the use of images was considered idolatry for some Protestant groups, such as among Scottish Presbyterians, about 8% of those sent to prison in Australia had religious tattoos. Religious tattoos were common among convicted British subjects of middle and lower classes, and were evenly distributed among Catholics and Anglicans (Alker and Shoemaker, 2022).

My point is that there is no prohibition in Western religions and, if there were, they did not prevent believers from tattooing (Morello, 2024). I understand that one way to overcome the limits of the sociology of religion is to pay attention to practices, to what people do to connect with the superhuman and not just to what religious institutions say. The perspective of lived religion, which focuses on practices, helps us to recover the religious dimension of tattooing.

Religious practices and their study

Numerous colleagues have highlighted popular religion as a particular way of doing religion that explores religious practices beyond the mandates of the institutional elites (Ameigeiras, 1989; De la Torre, Gutiérrez Zúñiga, 1989). et al., 2014; Parker Gumuccio, 1998, Semán, 2021).

The lived religion approach consolidated and expanded that perspective (Ammerman, 2021; Morello, 2021). By focusing on everyday religious practices, these studies highlight what ordinary people do. They focus on actions and not so much on institutional directives, investigate concrete practices, emphasizing the capacity of actors to generate and transmit religious meaning in everyday experiences (Pereira Arenas and Morello, 2022).

While this approach prioritizes subjective agency and creativity, it understands that religious practices occur in a sociohistorical context. People express themselves through practices shaped by both institutional traditions and popular culture, by what is available to them. Religion, even a "lived" one, is still a social construction (Ammerman, 2021; Rabbia et al., 2019).

According to Ammerman (2021), religious practices involve (like any other human practice) embodiment, materiality, emotions, aesthetics, moral judgment, and narrative. However, it is the intention to connect with the superhuman that makes it "religious." That intention may be explicit (because the person says so) or implicit (because the context suggests it).

Religious tattoos fulfill this description. They register a contact with the supra-human by materializing experiences that left an emotional imprint (Morello, 2021a). By modifying the skin they involve the body, such as pilgrimage or fasting (Inckle, 2016); they are made of a material (ink) and are an aesthetic choice subject to debates about taste and creativity (Kosut, 2014; Rees, 2016; Tranter and Grant, 2018). Finally, they involve a moral judgment about what is appropriate to tattoo (and on what part of the body), and what is not (Morello et al. 2021; Morello and DePaula, 2024).

Contemporary religious tattoos

Works on contemporary religious tattoos explore the characteristics, uses and complexities of tattooing. One of them is to be both "selfish" and "altruistic" (Simmel, in Wolf, 1950: 338). Tattoos, in general, are an aesthetic choice. People get them because they like them. In that sense they are "selfish", and at the same time they have an "altruistic" dimension. Just as tattoos are communication devices that people use to talk about themselves (Atkinson, 2003; Back, 2007; DeMello, 2000; Le Breton, 2013; Rosenblatt, 1997), religious tattoos communicate spiritual experiences (Ramos, 2002; Yllescas, 2018), they are opportunities to reflect and converse about the sacred (Barras and Saris, 2021; Foemmel, 2009; Pitts 2003; Tsou-Pin Chen, 2019).

Tattoos, personal and intimate, also imply a connection to a community (Morello, 2021a). They are marks of religious affiliation; situating the tattooed within a group (Dougherty and Koch, 2019; Maldonado-Estrada, 2020) or tradition (Petkoff, 2019).

Many times the tattoos are explicitly devotional and represent images of saints, demons, orishás, deities, crucifixes, Jesus, the Virgin Mary and angels, which function as domestic altars (Guerzoni, 2018; López Fidanza and Galera, 2014; Yllescas, 2018).

At other times, while not obviously religious, they capture the spiritual intent of the tattooed person with a "profane" symbol (Pitts, 2003; Rivardo and Keelan, 2010; Rosenblatt, 1997). There is a trend around tattoos and religious affiliations: unaffiliated people tend to have more tattoos than Catholics, and they more than Protestants. While religious people have alternatives to express their inner life (necklaces, images, garments), for unaffiliated people tattoos are one of the few ways to do so (Morello, 2021a).

Religious tattoos place the individual in a community that goes beyond this world, and connect him or her to a network of human and superhuman beings. Deceased tattoos, for example, are devices for making memory and communicating mourning, as they allow the decedent to talk about what happened (Cann, 2014; Davidson, 2016; Inckle, 2016).

Tattoos can mark physical pilgrimages and spiritual quests. Pilgrimage tattoos are evidence of the journey and a sign that the person changed, that he or she did not come back the same (Petkoff, 2019). Other tattoos signal transitions, a new stage in a spiritual itinerary (Foemmel, 2009; Parnell, 2019). Sometimes they mark mystical experiences (Maloney and Koch, 2019), by recording on the skin a message from divinity (Benson, 2000; Firmin et al., 2012).

Other tattoos are used to prevent harm (Kluger, 2021; Woodstock, 2014) or to remember overcoming trauma (both physical and mental, one's own or others'). Often, in the case of these healing tattoos, the very process of getting tattooed is considered cathartic, and the pain involved becomes more relevant (Pitts, 2003).

As with any other social practice, gender influences tattoos. Body size and location differ between women and men (Dougherty and Koch, 2019), as do their use and body expectations (Kloss, 2022; Maldonado-Estrada, 2020, Morello et al., 2021).

The work of tattoo artists

If tattoos have religious functions, it is not strange to imagine that tattoo artists have a spiritual role (Morello and De Paula, 2024).

In ancient societies in Europe and America, tattoos were performed by skilled individuals who were most likely performing a religious act (Krutak, 2015). Subsequently, tattooing became a part-time activity and, at the end of the century xixinto a full-time profession. With the growing popularity of tattoos and the technological improvement of tools, many tattooists began to understand their work as art (De Oliveira, 2016; Ferreira, 2008; Walzer Moskovic, 2015). The craft of tattooing, as a full-time profession associated with creativity, is a recent development.

This is important because with "artification" of tattooing (Kosut, 2014; Rees, 2016), tattoo artists have to navigate between artistic freedom and client expectations (Martin, 2018; Resenhoeft, Villa, & Wiseman, 2008). In tattooing, the canvas is a person with personal opinions, tastes, and choices (Sizer, 2020). The relationship between tattoo artists and clients was transformed; both the design and the tattoo experience have become more personal.

Often tattooers have to respond to the religious requirements of their clients, marking on the body a group affiliation, a spiritual experience, a healing (Tsou-Pin Chen, 2019). However, since they have control over the design, execution, placement, and size of the tattoo, tattooing is a site for the exercise of power (Barras and Saris, 2021).

The videos

These videos explore, from two cases of religious tattoos, the negotiations that occur in tattooing between clients and tattooists; between social and religious mandates; between artistic designs and technological possibilities; between civil and ecclesiastical authorities; between personal desires and social expectations. Something that, I speculate, is true of all religious practices.

Moreover, the videos show tattooing as a legitimate religious practice. And, in doing so, they question the exclusion of its study in the sociology of religion.

The videos present the cases of the cofrade tattoo (in Andalusia, Spain), and the pilgrimage tattoo (in Loreto, Italy). Originally designed to accompany the course Tattoos and Religion. Studying a Neglected Spiritual Practice, the videos contextualize the interactions between tattoo artists and their clients in the societies where they take place.

Both videos were made between July and October 2023. Funding was made possible, in part, by an Ignite research grant from the Boston College Office for the Vice Provost for Research.

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Gustavo Morello is a Jesuit, professor of Sociology at Boston College. D. from the University of Buenos Aires (2011), Master in Social Sciences from the National University of Córdoba (2001), Bachelor in Theology (2007, Universidad del Salvador, Bs. As.) and Philosophy (1991, Universidad del Salvador, Bs. As.). He taught at the Catholic University of Córdoba, Argentina (1997-2011), was "visiting researcher" at the University of Michigan (2009-2010) and "principal investigator" of the research project The Transformation of Lived Religion in Urban Latin America: a Study of Contemporary Latin Americans Experience of the Transcendent (2015-2018) and gave, in 2019, The D'Arcy Lectures, Campion Hall, University of Oxford, UK. Morello investigates the transformations of Latin American religiosity and its interactions with modernity. His latest book is An enchanted modernity. Religion lived in Latin America (educc, 2020).