In the campaign for the second round of Brazil’s presidential elections, to be held on 30 October, the chase for voters by denominational allegiance is in full swing. On Saturday 8 January President Jair Bolsonaro, baptised Catholic but with strong alliances in the neo-Pentecostal churches, took part in the 230-year old festival of Our Lady known as the Círio de Nazaré near the city of Belém on the estuary of the Amazon river in the state of Pará. The archbishop of Belém, Mgr Alberto Taveira Corrêa, said that the festival, as a religious event, could not be used for political purposes.
Bolsonaro took part in the part of the festival held on the river, in a navy corvette. The archbishop said: “There has been no invitation from the archdiocese of Belém, or from the organisers of the Nazaré festival, to any public official, municipal, state or federal…. We do not desire or allow any political or party use of the activities of the Círio.”
To mark the 230th Cirio, Pope Francis sent an Apostolic Blessing to Archbishop Taveira Corrêa that read the Pope “wishes to unite himself to the filial devotion of the faithful who have recourse to Our Lady of Nazareth, placing under her loving mantle and maternal protection the intentions they carry in their hearts”.
A group of Protestant political figures, led by Michele Bolsonaro, the President’s wife and a fervent Pentecostal, and the recently elected senator and Pentecostal pastor, Damares Alves, are due to tour the north-eastern states, where Lula, Bolsonaro’s left-wing opponent, won well over the 50 per cent necessary to be elected.
The Bolsonaro team will target women voters, who tend to support Lula. The tour is being supported by Silas Malafaia, the leader of the neo-Pentecostal church Assembly of God Victory in Christ, who was helping to organise a meeting of 250 religious leaders in Recife for Thursday 13 October. The leader of another neo-Pentecostal church welcomed Bolsonaro and his wife to a service on 8 October and promised to help them get votes in the north-east.
Two days earlier the Assemblies of God in São Paulo voted to punish members who voted for the left, claiming that it supported “a world view contrary to the Gospel”. Lula’s campaign team, meanwhile, is preparing videos targeting Protestant voters, but these had not aired at the time of writing.
Loading ...
