Desacralization

Desacralization is the effect ritual has on the center.

Characteristics

In ritual, the central object can never be exactly the same as it was on the commemorated scene. In this sense, the central object in ritual is always substituted (even if it is the "same" physical object), because there is always an aspect of the object that has changed. Ritual centered around a substituted central object has the effect of naming that central object in only the ways it held constant from the commemorated scene. This "magnification" of our observance of the central object is desacralization - as rituals are performed, our scenic resolution increases, and significance is no longer completely imbued in the central object as its whole self.