Saints of Resistance: Devotion in the Philippines under Early Spanish Rule

Eighty percent of Filipinos (about 80 million people) identify with the Catholic faith.Visitors to the Philippines might find it surprising that images of Catholic saints, the Child Christ, and the Virgin Mary can be seen in all kinds of public and private spaces throughout this Asian country, such as in restaurants, shopping malls, pasted to walls, painted on buses, and, of course, home altars. Many of these saints bear Spanish names and their legends almost always date to the period of Spanish colonialism.  Saints of Resistance: Devotions in the Philippines under Early Spanish Rule explores why, in spite of their fraught history with Spanish colonialism (which ended in 1898), Filipinos have staunchly held on to the faith in their saints. This is the first scholarly study to focus on the dynamic life of saints and their devotees in the Spanish Philippines, from the sixteenth through the early part of the eighteenth century. The book offers an in-depth analysis of the origins and deve