Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)This article discusses the so-called 'confessionalization processes' and their importance in understanding Early Modern Western history. The text begins with an attempt to clarify the distinctively 'modern' aspect of the confessional phenomenon; then seeks to outline the historiographical fortune of that phenomenon between the providentialist historiography practiced in the sixteenth century and the German social history of the second half of the twentieth century. Described in this context is the emergence of 'confessionalization theory' proposed by Wolfgang Reinhard and Heinz Schilling in the mid-1970s. Finally, the article proposes a critical reading of this theory and discusses the feasibility of its use, debugged of what are considered to be misconceptions and exaggerations; in particular, we are interested in its utility to historians from former colonial domains.231Research Support Foundation of the State of Sao Paulo (Fapesp) [2014/18183-7]Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)