Who’s afraid of Carnival?

They danced down the narrow street to the applause of the crowd, continuing along the street to the Black Men’s Church of Our Lady of the Rosary. They are the maracatus, traditional rural carnival troupes here in Olinda, north-east Brazil. To judge by their dress, they are evoking an eighteenth century scene. First comes a bewigged chamberlain twirling a ceremonial umbrella, then come the King and Queen, similarly attired, then the dancers. The energy is supplied by the drummers who bring up the rear, stripped to the waist as they beat out the rhythm of frevo. The bolder, or fitter, onlookers fall in behind.

Carnival in Olinda, the hilltop city overlooking the sprawl of its big sister Recife on one side and with dazzling views over the Atlantic to the other, is not like the highly publicised version in Rio de Janeiro, where motorised floats parade along a special avenue between spectators in stands. The narrow streets of old Olinda winding round the hill would make that impossible.

This year the maracatus have been celebrating Afro-Brazilian culture. Around 60 per cent of Brazilians have African ancestry, as a result of the slave trade, and after centuries of discrimination they are beginning to walk tall, partly due to the social policies of the centre-left Government that’s been in power for the last 14 years. The slaves brought with them their religion, with a whole pantheon of gods and goddesses known as orixás: Exú, the messenger, Ogum, the warrior, Jangô, the god of thunder and justice, Iemanjã, the goddess of the sea, whom millions of Brazilians venerate at New Year by throwing flowers into the sea.

Until about 50 years ago the African gods were worshipped under the names of Catholic saints: St George was Ogum, Iemanjã was Our Lady, and so on. It has since been recognised that these are two different religions, and African rituals in Catholic churches have been banned, while followers of candomblé or umbanda, as it is known, take pride in their places of worship, the terreiros.

But on the Catholic side, some of the openness to African spirituality encouraged in the 1960s and 1970s by bold leaders such as Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns in São Paulo and Archbishop Helder Câmara here in Recife has been lost as a generation of “safer” bishops appointed in the last two pontificates has retreated to their charismatic comfort zone. Arns and Câmara were charismatic in the best sense: they could inspire people with a transforming vision of society linked to the Gospel. Their successors – kindly men in general – have tried to fill their churches with a happy-clappy version of charismatic Catholicism that is often socially conservative.

Small wonder that many Catholics have left for the churches that have better tunes, namely the Pentecostals. The Pentecostals preach prosperity, which may be bad theology, but speaks to a generation moving up out of poverty. Perhaps now, under a risk-taking Pope, the bishops will come back to the Black Men’s Church of Our Lady of the Rosary, built by ex-slaves, and open its doors to their descendants and their faith.

Francis McDonagh writes for The Tablet on Brazil