São Paulo, metrópole católica: estratégias de demarcação territorial da Arquidiocese de São Paulo (1908 a 1943)

Abstract

The research -São Paulo, Catholic Metropolis: Strategies of territorial demarcation of the Archdiocese of São Paulo (1908 -proposes to observe the process of transformation of the state and city of São Paulo, considering the proposals and the impacts of the actions of the Catholic Church in the city undertaken by its executive arm, the Archdiocese and its collaborators. It intends to tell the history of the city and urbanism in São Paulo from the point of view of religious social actors, active during the republican period, and to problematize the traditional narrative that defines as inexorable the transition from the sacred to the profane that cities perform throughout history. The research also aims to show that the process is complex, full of tensions and setbacks, considering that religious agents did not passively watch their power fade away in the face of the laicization process characteristic of the early twentieth century. In this sense, it will have as its starting point the creation of the Archdiocese of São Paulo (1908) under the care of dom Duarte Leopoldo e Silva until the end of the term of the second archbishop of São Paulo, dom José Gaspar D'Afonseca e Silva (1943), in order to demonstrate the plans undertaken by the São Paulo institution in the process of territorial demarcation of São Paulo celebrated in the great religious event -the IV National Eucharistic Congress (1942) -where the Catholic Church aspired to project the image of São Paulo as a great Catholic Metropolis.