Les sites d’eau bénite chrétiens en Éthiopie et le sida : tensions entre des dynamiques sacrées et profanes

Abstract

In Ethiopia, the Christian holy water ritual is a traditional remedy for illness. At the beginning of the 1990s, the AIDS epidemic began to be tackled by holy water sites, which generated pilgrimages and spiritual cures. Traditionally, the holy water cure – a redemptive and purifying ritual – is exclusive of any other treatment. The use of other forms of therapy is been perceived as a sign of doubt in the divine capacity of the holy water to cure. Moreover, sites where water is considered blessed by the divine are sacred spaces and the introduction of too many profane elements has been regarded as undermining the power of the water. The free, large-scale distribution of antiretroviral drugs in Ethiopia and their arrival at holy water sites brought into question the compatibility of such treatments with holy water sites and the protection of the sacredness of these spaces. At Ent’ot’o Maryam, a site famous for its miraculous cures of HIV sufferers, the arrival of antiretroviral drugs destabilized the existing equilibrium and led to a transfer of holy water power to another site, Shenkuru Mika’él. At Shenkuru Mika’él some pilgrims living with HIV take antiretrovirals, but in a more discreet manner. Therefore, it appears that the two types of cure are not totally incompatible, but they serve to highlight the porosity of the borders between the sacred and the profane and the malleability of the holy water ritual.