Retrieving a Historical Fragment of the Nineteenth-Century Vietnamese Catholicism through the Pilgrimage Centre of Our Lady of Trà Kiệu
##plugins.themes.bootstrap3.article.main##
##plugins.themes.bootstrap3.article.sidebar##
Abstract
The Pilgrimage Centre of Our Lady of Trà Kiệu, which is located in Central Vietnam, serves as a significant religious and spiritual tourist venue, attracting thousands of visitors every year. This site has experienced many vicissitudes during the late nineteenth century when the Literati Movement or the Scholars’ Rising (Văn Thân) broke out and swept through many parishes. Trà Kiệu parish, however, demonstrated its resilience, gaining resurgence over time and becoming one of the notable pilgrimage and spiritual tourism sites of Catholicism in contemporary Central Vietnam. Nevertheless, this case is often obscured in the scholarship on Vietnamese Catholic history. Approaching from an interdisciplinary perspective, the research aims to retrieve a historical narrative of Trà Kiệu parish in the nineteenth century, partially reconstructing a fragment of the history of Catholicism in Vietnam. The article first elucidates the historical and cultural background of the Trà Kiệu site. It then analyses the alleged Marian apparition in Trà Kiệu and its miraculous effects on the consolidation of parishioners in their struggle against opposing forces. The article subsequently emphasizes on the ways in which the Trà Kiệu parish endeavours to sustain and reinvent the historical tradition of Marian devotion, transforming the Trà Kiệu site into a well-known pilgrimage centre that aims to serve the spiritual needs of Christians. In doing so, the research further attempts to provide insights into what Christians lived through such a historical experience during the period of the Literati Movement and how their Christian successors continued to uphold the historical tradition of Marian devotion to the present day.
How to Cite
##plugins.themes.bootstrap3.article.details##
historical fragment; Literati Movement; Our Lady of Trà Kiệu; pilgrimage centre; spiritual tourism; Vietnamese Catholicism
Đỗ T. G. et al. (2017), “Champa Citadels: An Archaeological and Historical Study”, Asian Review for World Histories, Vol. 5, Issue 2, pp. 70–105. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/22879811-12340006
Duong V. B. (2024), “Multiple Agents Involved in the Localization of Our Lady of La Vang: From a Mythic Figure to the Mother of Vietnam”, in L. C. Kelley and G. Sasges (eds), Vietnam Over the Long Twentieth Century. Global Vietnam: Across Time, Space and Community, Springer, Singapore, pp. 101–125. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-97-3611-9_6
Glover I. G. et al. (1996), “The Cham, Sa Huynh and Han in Early Vietnam: Excavations at Buu Chau Hill, Tra Kieu, 1993”, Bulletin of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association, Vol. 14, Chiang Mai Papers (Volume 1), pp. 166–176.
Hobsbawm E. (2013), “Introduction: Inventing Traditions”, in E. Hobsbawm and T. Ranger (eds), The Invention of Tradition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 1–14.
Kah Seng Loh et al. (2013), Oral History in Southeast Asia: Memories and Fragments, Palgrave Macmillan. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137311672
M. Geffroy, des Missions Etrangères de Paris, missionaire à la Cochinchine orienlaie (1886), “Une Page De La Persécution en Cochinchine”, in Les Missions Catholiques, Tome dix-huitième, Janvier-Décembre, pp. 428–439, 442–444, 452–455.
Magnússon S. G. (2003), “The Singularization of History: Social History and Microhistory within the Postmodern State of Knowledge”, Journal of Social History, Vol. 36, No. 3, pp. 701–735. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/jsh.2003.0054
Magnússon S. G. (2016), “Views into the Fragments: An Approach from a Microhistorical Perspective”, International Journal of Historical Archaeology, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp. 182–206.
McLeod M. W. (1997), “ ‘Pacify the Westerners and Massacre the Heretics!’ The Scholars’ Rising in Central Vietnam, 1874”, Crossroads: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Vol. 11, No. 2, pp. 35–71.
Ngô V. M. (2024), “Chúa Tiên Nguyễn Hoàng với vùng đất Duy Xuyên”, Tạp chí Khoa học Xã hội miền Trung, Số 2 (83), tr. 105–111. (In Vietnamese).
Nguyễn H. Đ. K. (2018), “Lịch sử Champa từ sơ khai đến cuối thế kỉ XV”, Báo Văn hóa Nghệ An, August 23, available at: http://vanhoanghean.com.vn/chi-tiet-tin-tuc/12627-lich-su-champa-tu-so-khai-den-cuoi-the-ki-xv (accessed December 10, 2025). (In Vietnamese).
Nguyễn Q. H. (2010), “Our Lady of La Vang and Tra Kieu in Vietnam Seen from the Non-Christian Viewpoint”, Religious Studies Review, Vol. 4, No. 04, pp. 59–71.
Nguyen T. V. L. and Nguyen V. S. (2020), “The Portuguese Influence in Hoi An (Vietnam) in Comparison with Malacca (Malaysia) and Ayutthaya (Thailand) during the 16th and 17th Centuries”, Asian and African Studies, Vol. 29, No. 1, pp. 72–88.
Phạm C. Đ. (2020), Đi tìm Đức Mẹ Trà Kiệu, Lưu hành nội bộ. (In Vietnamese).
Phạm C. Đ. (2024), Đền Đức Mẹ Trà Kiệu trên đồi Bửu Châu, Nhà xuất bản Đồng Nai, Đồng Nai. (In Vietnamese).
Phạm C. Đ. and Lưu V. T. (2018), Linh địa Trà Kiệu, Lưu hành nội bộ. (In Vietnamese).
Phan P. H. (1965), Việt Nam Giáo Sử, Quyển I (1533–1933), In lần thứ hai, Cứu Thế Tùng Thư, Sài Gòn. (In Vietnamese).
Thien-Huong T. N. (2017), Race, Gender, and Religion in the Vietnamese Diaspora The New Chosen People (Christianities of the World), Springer International Publishing A&G.
Tran T. K. A. (2024), Our Lady of La Vang: History and Theology of a Vietnamese Devotion, Pickwick Publications, Eugene, OR.
Trieu T. H. (2022), “An Influence of Foreign Culture: Hoi An and Christianity in Cochinchina in the 17th Century”, Academic Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences Burapha University, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 152–182.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.