Paper short abstract:

This presentation engages with religious mobility by looking at how migrants from Papua New Guinea are relocating Catholic shrines and ritual celebrations to Australia in order to celebrate their National Patron Saint Peter To Rot.

Paper long abstract:

This presentation engages with religious mobility by looking at how migrants from Papua New Guinea (PNG) are relocating Catholic shrines and ritual celebrations to Australia in order to celebrate their National Patron Saint Peter To Rot. In relocating rituals, regalia and images associated with Peter To Rot, PNG migrants generate 'belonging', as well as new connections and communities, fostered through the circulation of specific material religion. By looking at Peter To Rot celebrations in both Australia and PNG and migrant pilgrimages to the site of the Blessed Peter To Rot in Rabaul (East New-Britain, PNG), I aim to unravel the effects of ritual mobility in both locations. This shows how religious rituals and regalia can be an important source of identity and belonging for both Catholic and non-Catholic migrants. This confirms observations made elsewhere that mobility is implicated in re-assertions of the importance of place for the religious, and that religion is at the centre of many migrants' identities, with religious institutions, such as the Catholic Church, becoming a focal point for PNG migrant gatherings and opportunities to share and circulate knowledge and information.