LINE OF MIRACLE OR CONTAMINATION? SFÂNTA PARASCHEVA AS A CONTESTED PILGRIMAGE AMID COVID-19 PANDEMIC 2020

Abstract

Examining the largest pilgrimage in contemporary Romania, this article expands our knowledge of Christian pilgrimage in post-communist Eastern Europe. Ethnographic fieldwork undertaken in 2020 produces a thick description and analysis of the pilgrimage to Sfânta (Saint) Parascheva, Romania’s most important female saint in the Orthodox tradition, held annually in the country’s second city , Iaşi. The unexpected COVID-19 outbreak of 2020 produced a major shift in the pilgrimage. The article also shows how far-right groups, which, through public protest, sought to win mind-space and political legitimacy, exploited COVID-19 public health regulations imposed on the pilgrims. While the basic, well-regulated elements of the pilgrimage remained the same, these unexpected social actors introduced a new chaotic intensity with their contradictory narratives of protest. At Sfânta Parascheva in 2020, religious, nationalist and secular standpoints could be observed, turning the pilgrimage into a polysemic site of competing discourses.