Brazil

Eléonore Hughes 9-27-2023
Pictured is a hallway with white walls and barred windows. There is a man in a black pants and a white sweatshirt looking out of the window, with another man standing down the hall looking at him.

Following mandatory morning prayer services, some recuperandos (“recovering persons”) clean São João del-Rei APAC prison in eastern Brazil. 

WHEN GRAZIELA MARIANO'S former partner found out that she was in a relationship with someone else, he flew into a rage and attacked her. “We lived together for 13 years. He didn’t accept the breakup,” the 34-year-old Brazilian said. In defending herself, she ended up killing him.

Investigators eventually traced his death back to her. Mariano is waiting for her final sentence behind bars in the eastern city of São João del-Rei. But this jail, run by the Brazilian nonprofit Association for Protection and Assistance of Convicts (APAC), is not an ordinary penitentiary. “Theoretically, we’re in prison. But we’re not handcuffed and there are no weapons,” Mariano said.

In the 68 facilities that the nonprofit manages across Brazil, APAC implements a model in which inmates run aspects of the prison themselves. They wear their own clothes, make their own food, and oversee security and discipline. Referred to as recuperandos (“recovering persons”), prisoners are called by their name rather than by a number. Mariano, a former trainee nurse, works at night distributing medicine to fellow prisoners.

Camila Kersul, a psychologist who offers support to the more than 400 inmates at APAC in São João del-Rei, said, “APAC is essentially about offering dignity to inmates. The idea is to save the person’s identity to boost their self-esteem.”

Created by a group of Brazilian Catholics in the early 1970s, the acronym originally stood for Amando o Próximo, Amarás a Cristo (“Loving thy neighbor, thou shalt love Christ”). Christianity remains at the heart of the nonprofit’s philosophy. “God is the source of everything,” reads the final guiding principle of APAC’s decalogue. Each section of an APAC prison has a prayer room with Bibles and a cross where inmates are encouraged to renew themselves and take time out for reflection when they feel overwhelmed.

Mariano was delighted to move to the APAC facility eight months ago. She spent more than a year in a traditional prison: “I was pepper-sprayed. Food came with cockroaches. It was chaos, and guards were very cruel.” Not once was she permitted to see her three children, ages 6, 9, and 15. In APAC prisons, family ties are part of a prisoner’s rehabilitation. “Here, I arrived on a Tuesday and on the Sunday, I saw my family,” she said.

Joe Roos 4-24-2023
An illustration with a bright yellow background of a white robed arm with blue outlining. The hand thereof is holding the lower portion of a cross that's uneven and bendy in shape.

CSA-Archive / iStock

IN LATE MARCH, when Far Right former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro returned from self-imposed exile, supporters greeted him with chants of “God, family, and liberty,” harkening back to the motto of the dictatorship that ruled Brazil from 1964 to 1985. Overwhelming political support from evangelical Christians — similar to that received by Donald Trump — had swept Bolsonaro into office in 2018. Both men repaid this support by moving their respective embassies from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, actions that were long sought by conservative Christians in the West, signaling a rejection of Palestinian aspirations for independence.

Brazil is only one of the countries in Latin America where right-wing evangelical Christians have become a political force. Today, evangelicals constitute about 27 percent of Brazil’s population, compared to about 25 percent in the United States, according to the Pew Research Center. As the number of Latin American evangelicals has soared in recent years, Christian Zionism has also risen as a political and cultural force in the region.

Christian Zionists believe that support for the modern secular state of Israel is a scriptural obligation with theological ramifications for the “end times.” Too often Christian Zionists defend Israel while perpetuating Christian supremacy and antisemitism; they remain ignorant of the persecution of Jews throughout history. Adopting uncritical, religiously motivated support for the secular state of Israel, Christian Zionists provide cover for Israel’s internationally recognized human rights abuses against Palestinians. The embrace of Christian Zionism threatens to be as damaging to marginalized communities in Latin America as it has been to Palestinians.

4-21-2023
The cover image for the May 2023 issue of Sojourners, featuring an illustration of blue disembodied hands pulling white strings in various directions in the shape of the Enneagram symbol. The background is a mixture of bright colors of the rainbow.

The Enneagram's potential for building community and creating a more just society.

Liuan Huska 11-10-2022

An evangelical supporter of Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro gestures as she attends a campaign rally, in Brasilia, Brazil, October 28, 2022. Image credit: Rueters/Adriano Machado.

This election is just the most recent manifestation of deeper social divides in both the U.S. and Brazil. Benjamin A. Cowan, a historian at the University of California San Diego, notes that, since the 1980s, both countries have experienced a coalescing of “moral majorities” and right-wing populist groups, often with conservative Christians on the front lines. In Brazil, like in the U.S., certain affinities are grouped together. In the United States, a political slogan like “Jesus, guns, babies” attracts conservative constituents. In Brazil, conservatives rally around “beef, Bible, and bullets.” No wonder it feels like Texas.

A polling booth at the Complexo do Alemao  in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Nov. 15, 2020. REUTERS/Ricardo Moraes 

Nearly 13,000 candidates with religious titles ran for office in Brazil's Nov. 15 local elections – an increase of 24 percent compared to previous municipal elections.

Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro adjusts his mask as he leaves Alvorada Palace in Brasilia, Brazil. May 13, 2020. REUTERS/Adriano Machado

Even while Brazil is a COVID-19 global hot spot, some pastors flout social distancing. 

Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro and U.S. President Donald Trump shake hands during a bilateral meeting at the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, June 28, 2019. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Bolsonaro is forming alliances and shaping policies according to conservative evangelical religion. 

Robert Muggah 12-16-2019

Image via Shutterstock/Joa Souza 

Persecution of these Afro-Brazilian religions, whose adherents are largely poor black Brazilians, has been around since at least the 19th century.

11-11-2019

Image via REUTERS/Ricardo Moraes 

Among Christians in the United States, evangelicals are least likely to believe that climate change is real and human caused, according to public opinion polls and academic research. This is not the case in Brazil. There, evangelicals and Pentecostals – who make up about 30 percent of the Brazilian population – are just as environmentally concerned as other religious groups, public opinion surveys show.

Zoe Sullivan 8-06-2019

Illustration by Lisa Ryan

Vitoria thought it was strange when her church’s youth-group leader asked her if he could come to her house to talk about upcoming plans for the group. Vitoria, 18 at the time, had been active in First Baptist Church of Rio Doce in Olinda, Brazil. Recently, though, she had been attending youth services at a friend’s nearby church.

The youth-group leader arrived at Vitoria’s home and asked to use the bathroom. When he came out, she said, he held out his cell phone to show her something. “When he came in and was going to show me the plans, he reached around my back and tried to unclasp my bra,” Vitoria said.

Vitoria asked him what he was doing. Then, she said, he dragged her into her bedroom and raped her.

“Here in Brazil, the movement has gone in the opposite direction”

While Brazil’s Carnival celebrations are famous for their libidinous nature, less well known are the expectations that women in the country “stay in their place.”

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro speaks at an event with Israeli and Brazilian business people, attended by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in Jerusalem April 2, 2019.

According to Francirosy Campos, anthropologist and professor at the University of São Paulo (USP), the main problem faced by Muslims in Brazil is prejudice and threats, many of them made on social networks, particularly on Facebook.

David Kane 3-21-2019

JAIR BOLSONARO, Brazil’s recently elected president, chose as his campaign theme “Brazil above everything, God above everybody.” The first phrase is a shout from his days as a military parachutist and the second a nod to the growing power and influence of evangelicals in Brazil.

According to the 2010 Brazilian census, evangelicals—who control extensive media networks and are increasingly involved in politics—make up 22 percent of the population, up from only 9 percent two decades earlier.

Churches such as the Assemblies of God and the prosperity gospel-influenced Universal Church of the Reign of God have used various forms of media to reach larger audiences, starting with local radio stations in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1989, the Universal Church bought a national television network, Rede Record. It is now the second largest network in Brazil and strongly supports Bolsonaro. Today the Universal Church owns more than 20 television stations and 50 radio stations, as well as publishing companies and studios.

In 1986, when the first election after 20 years of military dictatorship was held, the number of Protestant lawmakers jumped to 36, with 20 Pentecostals joining the evangelical caucus. For the first time, a journalist used the term Bancada da Biblia (Bible Bench). Since then, the number of evangelicals has increased in each Congress, except in 2006 when several were involved in scandals ranging from a payment-for-votes scheme to the “Bloodsuckers Operation” that uncovered hospital payment fraud.

Lisa Sharon Harper 1-23-2019

Marielle Franco. UOL Notícias

MORE THAN 50 black women and a handful of black men huddled in a narrow room of an unmarked church on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. The women were adorned with natural hair and were happy to be together, but I noticed a seriousness about them. Many had traveled two hours or more via public transportation. This was not just a meeting: It was an event.

Our gathering formed in the shadow of Brazil’s recent election. Jair Bolsonaro won the Brazilian presidency, promising to target black women activists, LGBTQ people, and others and to bring in militarized security forces to squash violence in shantytown communities known as favelas. Seventy percent of evangelical Christians voted for Bolsonaro, giving him his win.

At our meeting, worship leaders led the women in singing songs about the God who promises a day when oppression will be lifted. One of the songs honored the brown, colonized girl named Maria, whose Magnificat promised these women’s liberation.

A year has passed since the assassination of 38-year-old black Rio de Janeiro councilwoman Marielle Franco. Franco, who challenged police brutality and extrajudicial killings, was shot while riding in the back seat of a car. Two hours before she was slain, she called for black women to engage in politics to bring about a just Brazil. The bullets that killed her were purchased in 2006 by federal police in the nation’s capital city of Brasilia.

Brazil’s Carnival has presented the country as a happy, diverse nation where black women can dance without shame or consequence. I didn’t know Brazil was the last nation in the world to abolish slavery and that 4.8 million Africans were shipped there over a span of nearly 400 years. I also didn’t know that after abolition in Brazil, the Portuguese elite begged Europeans to “whiten” their mostly African nation and “civilize” it. They promised 4 million Europeans seeds and free transportation to Brazil, while formerly enslaved Africans received nothing.

Rishika Pardikar 10-24-2018

"Not Him" demonstrations against presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro in Brasilia, Brazil Sept. 29, 2018. REUTERS/Adriano Machado

Brazil’s 2018 presidential elections are scheduled to go into a second round Oct. 28, with Jair Bolsonaro squaring off against Fernando Haddad after they secured the most number of votes but failed to meet the 50 percent threshold in the Oct. 7 election.

Sharrelle Barber 3-22-2018

People take part in a rally against the murder of Brazilian councilwoman Marielle Franco, in Sao Paulo, Brazil March 15. REUTERS/Leonardo Benassatto
 

To be clear, Marielle Franco was assassinated for speaking out against police brutality and the plight of blacks and the poor in the favelas of Rio and because she had a seat at the table of power. Marielle was a city councilor who, just 18 months prior, had received the fifth highest vote count out of 51 city councilors voted into local office in Rio. She was a part of the mere 5 percent of black and indigenous women who occupied seats of power in local government though they account for over a quarter of Brazil’s total population. Her ascension to political power surprised many as a young, black LGBTQ woman who had grown up in one of the largest favelas in Rio. However unlikely, Marielle was committed to using her platform to elevate and amplify the voices of her community and her constituents. 

Image via RNS/Marcel Antonisse via Creative Commons

Brazilian Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns, one of the most important figures in modern Brazil, died on Dec. 14 in Sao Paulo. He was 95.

Known as Dom Paulo, he was appointed bishop in 1966 and served as archbishop of the Sao Paulo Archdiocese from 1970 to 1998. But he was better known as the “people’s bishop,” and embodied the progressive church movement in South America.

Image via /Shutterstock.com

“I dream of sports as the practice of human dignity, turned into a vehicle of fraternity,” the pope says.

“Do we exercise together this prayer intention? That sports may be an opportunity for friendly encounters between people and may contribute to peace in the world.”

Cathleen Falsani 6-06-2016

Since the 1960s, Simon’s musical dialogue with his audience has been an adventure: through the mean streets of pre-Bloomberg New York City, on a bus across America, with a runaway bride, into the townships of South Africa, Chernobyl, the Amazon, fatherhood, the deep South, the ups-and-downs of enduring love, questions about mortality, and dreams of the afterlife.

That conversation (and adventure) continues with Stranger to Stranger at the velvet rope of a nightclub, with a homeless “street angel,” in a hospital emergency room, at the riverbank, an insomniac’s bedside, and a village in central Brazil that some might describe as a “thin place” — where the veil between this world and whatever lies beyond it is like gossamer.

Angela Denker 5-27-2016

Image via /Shutterstock.com

Diseases don't read, but they understand social contracts. They kill and maim the poorest and weakest among us first: pregnant women, people without air conditioning, people who have to store water outside in case of shortages, places where mosquitoes breed and grow and bite and viruses swarm the placenta and maim a growing baby's brain.

Ed Spivey Jr. 5-04-2016
Callahan / Shutterstock

Callahan / Shutterstock

THAT STATUE of Jesus standing with outstretched arms over Rio de Janeiro has always made a powerful impression on me; namely, how tired I would get if I did that for very long. These days, I don’t even greet family members with outstretched arms without written permission from my orthopedist, much less stand on a hillside piously overlooking a large population. (Not that anyone would ask me to. I’m very busy.)

It’s an awesome Jesus, although it has no moving parts and doesn’t light up at Christmas. It’s shorter than our own Statue of Liberty, and less green, and you can’t walk up a stairway inside it to peer out the top of his head which, in my opinion, is the creepiest thing you can do inside an American shrine. Unless it’s watching a baby spit up at the top of the Washington Monument, which I did years ago, after walking up the 897 steps to prove the stamina and grit of youth. (Come to think of it, maybe it was me that spit up.)

Nonetheless, that Jesus statue stands over Rio, night and day, making the people below extremely uncomfortable because they’re being constantly monitored by the Risen Lord. One can only hope that Rio’s famous nude beaches are outside his peripheral vision. (No peeking, sir.)

Living in Rio is hard enough, what with speaking a language that’s not quite Spanish. Portuguese is to Spanish as apples are to oranges, if the oranges tasted like bananas. Unlike the rest of South America, Brazil got stuck with Almost Spanish because in the late 1400s colonial powers Spain and Portugal divided up the continent using the negotiating technique of the day: rock, paper, scissors. Portugal chose rock. It was a different time then, with a different mentality. Five centuries later, we now know you should always choose paper.