Location
Monserrat
Start Date
26-6-2026 9:30 AM
End Date
26-6-2026 11:00 AM
Description
This paper addresses the renewed resurgence of religious spirituality in contemporary culture and its implications for the management and communication of institutional religious events. As Hoover (2025) observes, “individuals today construct identity and meaning through practices of cultural consumption”, prompting a reappraisal of the religious event as a transformative experience. Drawing on scholarship in religious communication and event management, alongside documents of the Catholic Church’s Magisterium, the study conceptualizes the religious event as a process that offers transcendence attuned to contemporary cultural codes. Within this framework, events in public spaces or along pilgrimage routes emerge as polyhedral realities where the kerygma, the fundamental content of Catholic identity, becomes visible.
Building on Dowson’s (2024) proposal, the analysis argues that event management should function not merely as a set of technical tools, but as an overarching framework reflecting the cultural norms and ontological identity of faith communities. Yet management alone cannot sustain this integrative vision; communication (Gregoy & Willis, 2022) must also operate within a strategic unity that moves beyond the mere eventization of faith as a marketing platform (Pfadenhauer, 2010; Hitzler, 2011).
By aligning the richness of the Christian tradition with professional event practices, the Church fulfills its pastoral mission and offers coherent public witness. Thus, the communicative dimension of the religious event emerges as a timely response to contemporary cultural needs, enabling expressions of faith and personal experience to converge within a meaningful, professionally designed framework.
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Included in
H1) The Communicative Dimension of the Religious Event in the Event Management of Contemporary Culture
Monserrat
This paper addresses the renewed resurgence of religious spirituality in contemporary culture and its implications for the management and communication of institutional religious events. As Hoover (2025) observes, “individuals today construct identity and meaning through practices of cultural consumption”, prompting a reappraisal of the religious event as a transformative experience. Drawing on scholarship in religious communication and event management, alongside documents of the Catholic Church’s Magisterium, the study conceptualizes the religious event as a process that offers transcendence attuned to contemporary cultural codes. Within this framework, events in public spaces or along pilgrimage routes emerge as polyhedral realities where the kerygma, the fundamental content of Catholic identity, becomes visible.
Building on Dowson’s (2024) proposal, the analysis argues that event management should function not merely as a set of technical tools, but as an overarching framework reflecting the cultural norms and ontological identity of faith communities. Yet management alone cannot sustain this integrative vision; communication (Gregoy & Willis, 2022) must also operate within a strategic unity that moves beyond the mere eventization of faith as a marketing platform (Pfadenhauer, 2010; Hitzler, 2011).
By aligning the richness of the Christian tradition with professional event practices, the Church fulfills its pastoral mission and offers coherent public witness. Thus, the communicative dimension of the religious event emerges as a timely response to contemporary cultural needs, enabling expressions of faith and personal experience to converge within a meaningful, professionally designed framework.