According to Pelras' "The Bugis", the Bugis people retained their pre-Islamic belief of white-blooded divine rulers and red-blooded commoners, as set out in the I La Galigo sacred text, even after conversion to Islam. The old Bugis religion was somewhat in a class of its own. The white-blooded rulers were descendants of Bataru Guru, who in turn was the descendant of Datu Patoto, who in turn was the descendant of a pair of solar deities who were the descendants of another pair of solar deities, who were created by the original supreme god in the Bugis context (talk about pedigree.
). Bataru Guru had a grandson - Sawerigading, who in turn sired La Galigo, the character after whom the epic was named after. Actually, the story mainly revolved around Sawerigading.
The famous calabai (transexual men) Bissu priests were still very much in existence, even today. A couple of years back, there was a play based on the I La Galigo cycle that came to Singapore. The play was blessed by a Bissu priest at the beginning, and I read that the Bissu priest also insisted on finding the exact centre (the 'navel' of the earth) of the Esplanade Theatres to perform his rites before the rehearsals could begin.
Most Bugis carried out 2 wedding ceremonies, one in accordance to Islamic requirements, another according to tradition, involving the Bissu (if the couple are 'white-blooded'), which is reminiscent of the courtship trials of princess We Cudai by Sawerigading. Some more Islamically-inclined Bugis only carry out the Islamic wedding ceremonies, while some non-Muslim Bugis only carry out the traditional wedding ceremonies.
My understanding is that when the Bugis rulers were contemplating whether to convert to Christianity or to Islam, they considered which religion would accord more flexibility for them to retain their 'divine ruler' status. Christianity had an early advantage because the rulers thought it was more flexible. However, they were mistaken, and the Christian instituition was slow to follow-up with the conversion of the rulers, which resulted in the King of Luwu, the legendary 1st Bugis kingdom, converting to Islam. The conversion had profound impact on the rest of S. Sulawesi, which had always regarded Luwu as the spiritual leader state of sorts. And hence, most Bugis became Muslims. However, the old deities did not disappear; they were accorded lower status, and sometimes, given different names.