宗教經驗的召喚與祖先記憶的重塑：屏東萬金天主教徒的記憶、儀式與認同

Abstract

本論文的主要目的是探討屏東萬金天主教徒如何在天主教禮儀年度的週期循環裡，以親身經歷的身體行動，不斷重新實行各種節慶儀式的活動，型塑出並沈浸在與過去同在的延續感，同時也在身體行動裡共享過去的記憶，以此建構出以悠久的天主教信仰與文化為認同核心的一體感。我從宗教經驗與祖先記憶的角度切入，分析萬金天主教徒如何在儀式展演的身體感官與情緒感受裡，召喚出相關聯的記憶片段與元素，加以吸收、拼接、修整、改造之後，持續地重新塑造他們對於過去和祖先的特殊看法與體驗。 在年度節期慶典的一再重複實行之下，循環往復的社區時間與集體活動的實踐過程形成「生活在一樣的時間裡」的感覺，並且透過不斷付諸行動、身體力行並親身經歷的儀式展演，萬金天主教徒在宗教經驗裡的身體感官與情緒感受觸發、召喚了與「受苦」、「流離」、「不確定」等感受相關連的過去記憶，藉著「關連性的重複」銜接、齧合過去與當下的行動。而且，萬金天主教徒以天主教做為祖先傳統，「全面性地取代」了過去的異教傳統。雖然顛沛流離的旅程與遭受迫害的苦難切斷了祖先的過去，但是萬金吸納、融合了不同來源的落難教友，透過天主教信仰與文化將異質性的人群轉化成擁有共享歷史與記憶的群體。因此，藉著遺忘與選擇，萬金天主教徒才能以天主教信仰與文化重新定位自己的認同，取代因為不斷遷徙而失去與過去連結的祖先記憶。 本論文的另一個目的是嘗試以萬金天主教徒的認同形成過程，為台灣平埔研究提供一個具有啟發性的民族誌案例。我認為所謂的「平埔人群」並不是建立在客體化的文化概念以及本質化的認同之上，而是取決於人們對過去和歷史的看法，是行動者本身主動地參與、選擇與創造他們自己對於歷史和過去的瞭解。萬金天主教徒藉著不斷付諸行動、親身參與的身體實踐建構出自我認同的重要內涵，以儀式展演的當下行動定義自己做為萬金天主教社群的成員，融合成為擁有共同的過去記憶與獨特認同的群體。以當下行動定義過去，活動本身同時也在製造歷史形成萬金天主教徒特殊的歷史意識。因此，我相信歷史性概念比族群性概念更能夠幫助我們理解「平埔人群」做為歷史行動者的生活經驗，更希望能夠藉由歷史性概念來探討他們自己如何看待過去，並且如何從過去來反思現在。

This thesis is concerned about how Bankim Catholics perceive their past through Catholic feasts and rituals, and how they reformulate their identity through the culturally patterned ways of experiencing and understanding their history in the foot of mountain area on the Pingtung Plain. Approaching these questions by the perspectives of religious experiences and ancestral memories, I explore how Bankim Catholics evoke relevant elements of past memories through bodily sensations and emotions in the ritual performances, how they experience a simultaneity with the past through cyclical reenactment of the yearly-round Catholic feasts and rituals, and how they construct their identity through reformulating the “ancestral” traditions. During the long processes of forced migration and religious persecution, Bankim inhabitants disconnect with their ancestral past. In their embodied and enacted forms of past memories, Bankim Catholics repetitively experience feelings of “suffering,” “being displaced,” and “uncertainty,” and continually articulate the past and the present through the principle of “repetition of the relevancy.” Moreover, Catholicism turns Bankim into a particular place for incorporating displaced refugees and persecuted believers from different origins, and replaces different ancestral traditions by Catholic culture. Therefore, Bankim Catholics emphasize Catholicism as their ancestral tradition, which over-all replaces ambiguous past of pagan ancestors. Through forgetting and selection, they re-define their ancestral traditions and construct their contemporary self-identity. The other purpose of this thesis is to challenge the Pingpu study in Taiwan. Based on the assumption of ethnicity, researchers of the Pingpu study construct images of reified and objectified “Pingpu” cultures; furthermore, these academic discourses form essentialized identity among “Pingpu” people. However, I argue that the idea of historicity is more suitable for us to understand how people as historical actors are able to create their own understanding of history and past actively, and how they construct their historical agency to think about the present reflexively.