Preservacion del patrimonio cultural a partir del turismo religioso: el caso de las peregrinaciones de Los Pajareros en Mexico

Pilgrimages are one of the practices of religious tourism, which attract visitors in countries such as Mexico for the influence of Catholicism and syncretism with pre-Hispanic cultures. In the context of this phenomenon, there are pilgrimages with tourism potential that represent an opportunity for economic development. Therefore, the objective of this manuscript was to analyze the pilgrimages of people who inherited a pre-Hispanic profession in Mexico as a potential resource for cultural and religious tourism. The pilgrimages of the families that traditionally dedicate to bird trade, which consists to catch birds in an artisanal way and sell trained song birds. We identified pilgrimages with song birds in San Luis Potosí, State of Mexico, Jalisco, Queretaro, Hidalgo and Mexico City where pajareros carry cages stacked vertically in the back with song birds such as mockingbirds and solitaires to the church to celebrate a mass. Song birds are an offering to give thanks to the Virgin and to God, to rejoice with their songs and to meet up with other pajareros families. The party display a tourist attraction due to its colorful and quantity of song birds that sing at great volume. Unfortunately this tradition is decreasing and fewer pajareros are attending them. This work shows that birds have cultural and religious value and these ceremonies have a tourist potential, which would help this tradition to be strengthened. Una de las prácticas del turismo religioso son las peregrinaciones o procesiones, las cuales atraen visitantes en países como México por la influencia del catolicismo y el sincretismo con las culturas prehispánicas. En el contexto de este fenómeno, hay peregrinaciones con potencial turístico que representan oportunidad de desarrollo económico. Por ello, el objetivo de este trabajo fue analizar las peregrinaciones que realizan personas herederas de un oficio prehispánico en México como potencial recurso para el turismo cultural y religioso. En ese orden de ideas, existen procesiones de familias que se dedican al oficio tradicional de pajarero, el cual consiste en capturar de manera artesanal y vender aves entrenadas para cantar. Estas peregrinaciones están identificadas en San Luis Potosí, Estado de México, Jalisco, Querétaro, Hidalgo y Ciudad de México donde los pajareros cargan jaulas apiladas verticalmente en la espalda con aves cantadoras como cenzontles, jilgueros y clarines hasta la iglesia para celebrar una misa. Las aves son una ofrenda pa