The Sacred Lives of Things: Revaluing church objects as heritage and commodities

Abstract

One in five Dutch churches has lost its original function in the last decades, due to declining religious affiliation and secularization. When a church building is decommissioned and has to be repurposed, the objects inside it are often required to be removed. In these moments of forced mobility, reflection on the value of church objects is required. In Roman Catholic churches in the Netherlands, rules and regulations are implemented to restrict these movements and to prevent objects from ending up in what are considered the ‘wrong’ hands. This study examines the ways in which the restrictions on church objects attributes value to items, and highlights how personal relations that people and objects develop sometimes subvert these restrictions and attribute value to objects in a different way. Focusing on churches and a religious heritage museum in Utrecht and on an antique shop specializing in religious art in Limburg, which are places where church objects often end up, this study offers a comparative perspective through which changing values can be examined. I propose to understand the movement of church objects from a church to a different context as a move from one economy to another. In these different economies, objects are interpreted and used differently and therefore can be understood as powerful mediators, which mediate different things. In Roman Catholic churches objects can be consecrated, which imbues them with a ‘sticky’ value which cannot so easily be removed when it moves to another economy. Studying the sacred through the lens of economy provides a new perspective on the materiality of secularization and the changing religious practices which come with it.