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Brazil’s evangelical churches growing; leaders of two churches face fraud charges
Growing numbers swap Roman Catholicism for Evangelicalism
Reborn in Christ is among a growing number of evangelical churches in Brazil that are finding ways to connect with younger people to swell their ranks.
From fight nights to reggae music to video games and on-site tattoo parlors, the churches have helped make evangelicalism the fastest-growing spiritual movement in Brazil.
Evangelical Christian churches are luring Brazilians away from Roman Catholicism, the dominant religion in Brazil. In 1950, 94 percent of Brazilians said they were Catholic, but that number fell steadily to 74 percent by 2000.
Meanwhile, the percentage of those who described themselves as evangelicals grew by five times in that period, reaching 15 percent in 2000. A new government census is due out next year.
Despite Brazil’s deep connection to Catholicism, more and more Brazilians want to experiment and choose their own religion, said Silvia Fernandes, a professor at the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro, who wrote a book about Brazil’s evangelical movement.
She said more Brazilians were attracted to evangelical churches, or Pentecostalism, for the “flexibility of the religious expression.” They see churches like Reborn as places where they can express themselves more freely, and “not only look for solutions to personal problems, but also find a place to meet and socialize.”
[...]Amid the youth movement, Reborn in Christ has suffered its share of controversy.
The church’s leaders, Estevam and Sônia Hernandes, returned to Brazil last month after serving several months in an American prison for trying to smuggle more than $56,000 into the United States, including $9,000 concealed in a Bible.
They still face fraud, larceny, tax evasion and money laundering charges in Brazil.
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See also:
Reborn in Christ Church: The path to power
The Hernandeses, who lead the Igreja Apostolica Renascer em Cristo (Reborn in Christ Church), are two of the most powerful and controversial religious leaders in Brazil, where the evangelical church grows bigger every day.
[...]For many, their upcoming trial confirms long-held suspicions that sections of Brazil’s flamboyant evangelical church use religion as a pretext for fraud, money laundering and organised crime.
Brazil’s evangelical church, an umbrella term that includes Pentecostals, Baptists and other denominations, has exploded in size since the early 1980s. Its congregation now totals about 26-million crentes, or believers, in a country of 188-million people.
Last August, the leaders of another huge Brazilian church movement — the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God — were also charged with fraud.
• Fraud allegations rock Brazil church
• Brazil’s evangelical movement has become a major social, political force
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