Sacred World Heritage Sites. Balancing Meaning and Management

The author reviews 166 World heritages Sites, 29% of those included in the UNESCO list when the work was done, that have a religious or sacred meaning, analyzing its characteristics. She found that the sites belong to several different religious traditions, but most (51%) are Christian and located in the Northern hemisphere. The analysis was done in the contextual framework of contemporary cultural tourism, discussing the management challenges that need to be faced to ensure the proper heritage conservation, an enhanced visitors experience and retaining the sense of the sacred.