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‘God Even Blessed Me with Less Money’: Disappointment, Pentecostalism and the Middle Classes in Brazil

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2017

GEORGE ST. CLAIR
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Abstract

Through shedding light on traditional Pentecostalism in Brazil this article reveals how middle-class people in São Paulo, Brazil, manage disappointment relating to current socio-economic conditions. Ethnographic research on Brazil's oldest Pentecostal church, which preserves an anachronistic style of practice, shows how people embrace a marginal identity and thereby critique social conditions in the country. In stark contrast to newer forms of Pentecostalism, people featured in this paper respond to an ‘anti-prosperity gospel’, in which failures and setbacks are construed as signs of spiritual purity and development. In a country where a ‘new middle class’ is supposedly finding prosperity, this study shows a religiously-oriented way in which people confront the disappointing gap between the promises of neoliberalism and the realities of jobless growth.

Spanish abstract

Al analizar el pentecostalismo tradicional en Brasil, este artículo revela cómo personas de la clase media en São Paulo, Brasil, manejan sus frustraciones relacionadas a las actuales condiciones socioeconómicas. La investigación etnográfica sobre la iglesia pentecostal más antigua de Brasil, cuya práctica preserva un estilo anacrónico, muestra cómo la gente adopta una identidad marginal y por lo tanto critica las condiciones sociales del país. Con un marcado contraste con formas más nuevas de pentecostalismo, las personas analizadas acá responden a un ‘credo de la anti-prosperidad’, en el cual las fallas y los fracasos se construyen como signos de pureza y desarrollo espirituales. En un país donde una ‘nueva clase media’ supuestamente está encontrando prosperidad, este estudio muestra formas de ser orientadas religiosamente en la que la gente confronta la frustrante distancia entre las promesas del neoliberalismo y las realidades del crecimiento sin empleo.

Portuguese abstract

Ao analisar o pentecostalismo tradicional no Brasil, este artigo revela como a classe média de São Paulo, Brasil, lida com a decepção relacionada à situação socioeconômica atual. A pesquisa etnográfica na igreja pentecostal mais antiga do Brasil, que preserva um estilo anacrônico de prática, demonstra como as pessoas adotam uma identidade marginal e assim criticam as condições sociais do país. Contrastando profundamente com novas formas de pentecostalismo, as pessoas representadas neste artigo respondem a uma ‘teologia da anti-prosperidade’, na qual fracassos e adversidades são considerados sinais de pureza e desenvolvimento espirituais. Em um país onde uma ‘nova classe média’ supostamente está encontrando prosperidade, este estudo apresenta uma forma orientada pela religião pela qual as pessoas confrontam a frustrante distância entre as promessas neoliberais e as realidades de um crescimento sem trabalho.

Keywords

BrazilPentecostalismanthropologynew middle classBrasilpentecostalismoantropologíanueva clase mediaBrasilpentecostalismoantropologianova classe média
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 3 , August 2017 , pp. 609 - 632
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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References

1 According to 2000 census data from the Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (Brazilian Geographical and Statistical Institute, IBGE), of Brazil's 17.7 million Pentecostals around 2.5 million belonged to the CCB, or just over 14% ( Campos, Leonildo Silveira, ‘As origens norte-americanas do pentecostalismo brasileiro: observações sobre uma relação ainda pouco avaliada’, Revista USP 67: 100–15 (2005), p.113CrossRefGoogle Scholar). The subsequent 2010 IBGE census showed a decrease in CCB membership from 2,489,079 in 2000 to 2,289,634 in 2010. However, the 2010 data still show the CCB as the second largest Pentecostal church in Brazil (accounting for 10% of Brazil's Pentecostals), with several hundred thousand members more than the third largest, the Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus (Universal Church of the Kingdom of God). In my research church Elders told me that CCB's own records showed between 3 and 4 million members, and that government statistics understate the number because CCB members are usually discreet about their affiliation.

2 See Bartelt, Manoel (ed.), A ‘nova classe média’ no Brasil como conceito e projeto político (Rio de Janeiro: Fundação Heinrich Böll, 2013)Google Scholar.

3 The alphabetical class nomenclature is derived from the Critério de Classificação Econômica Brasil (Brazilian Economic Classification Criterion, CCEB), a statistical report produced by the Associacção Brasileira de Empresas de Pesquisa (Brazilian Association of Research Bodies, ABEP). This categorisation uses as indices household characteristics – principally the presence and quantity of domestic luxury items – in order to differentiate the market into economic classes. A correspondence is made between household purchasing power and economic strata, defined as (highest to lowest) A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2, D, E.

4 Bartelt (ed.), A ‘nova classe média’ no Brasil.

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8 On the significant role of the Casas Bahia department store chain in facilitating consumer credit, see Yaccoub, ‘A chamada “nova classe média”’, pp. 224–8.

9 Bolsa família (family grant) was part of a network of federal assistance programmes set up by the PT government. It provided financial aid directly to poor Brazilian families.

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15 O'Dougherty, Consumption Intensified.

16 Caldeira, City of Walls.

17 Bartelt (ed.), A ‘nova classe média’ no Brasil.

18 Holston, James, Insurgent Citizenship: Disjunctions of Democracy and Modernity in Brazil (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008)Google Scholar.

19 According to the 2010 IBGE census, there are just over 25 million self-declared Pentecostals in Brazil, or slightly more than 7.5 per cent of the population.

20 Rolim, Francisco C., O que é pentecostalismo? (São Paulo: Editora Brasiliense, 1987)Google Scholar; Chesnut, Andrew, Born Again in Brazil: The Pentecostal Boom and the Pathogens of Poverty (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1997)Google Scholar.

21 Rolim, O que é pentecostalismo?, p. 82.

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25 Lima, ‘“Trabalho”, “mudança de vida” e “prosperidade” entre fiéis’; ‘Prosperity and Masculinity: Neopentecostal Men in Rio de Janeiro’, Ethnos, 77: 3 (2012), pp. 372–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

26 Neri, A nova classe média.

27 Lima, ‘Prosperity and Masculinity’, p. 374.

28 Ibid., p. 388.

29 Mariano, Ricardo, ‘Mudanças no campo religioso brasileiro no Censo 2010’, Debates do NER, 2: 24 (2013), pp. 119–37, here p. 132Google Scholar.

30 Martin, David, Tongues of Fire: The Explosion of Protestantism in Latin America (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990)Google Scholar; Stoll, David, Is Latin America Turning Protestant? The Politics of Evangelical Growth (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1990)Google Scholar.

31 See Birman, Patricia and Lehmann, D., ‘Religion and the Battle for Ideological Hegemony: The Universal Church of the Kingdom of God and TV Globo in Brazil’, Bulletin of Latin American Research, 18: 2 (1999), pp. 1–17 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Birman, Patricia and Leite, M., ‘Whatever Happened to what Used to be the Largest Catholic Country in the World?’, Daedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 129: 2 (2000), pp. 271–90Google Scholar.

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34 Coleman, Simon, The Globalisation of Charismatic Christianity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; see also Lima, ‘“Trabalho”, “mudança de vida” e “prosperidade” entre fiéis’.

35 Ribeiro, Suzana Barretto, Italianos do Brás: imagens e memórias, 1920–1930 (São Paulo: Editora Brasiliense, 1994)Google Scholar.

36 The church conducted all services and printed documents in Italian until 1935.

37 Almeida, Ronaldo, A Igreja Universal e seus demônios: um estudo etnográfico (São Paulo: Editora Terceiro Nome, 2009), p. 53 Google Scholar.

38 Freston, Paul, ‘Pentecostalism in Brazil: A Brief History’, Religion, 25: 2 (1995), pp. 119–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Mariano, Neopentecostais; ‘Mudanças no campo religioso’; ‘Expansão Pentecostal no Brasil: o caso da Igreja Universal’, Estudos Avançados, 18: 52 (2004), pp. 121–38, here p. 129CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Brandão, Carlos R., ‘Fronteiras da fé – alguns sistemas de sentido, crenças e religiões no Brasil de hoje’, Estudos Avançados, 18: 52 (2004), pp. 261–88CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Almeida, A Igreja Universal e seus demônios.

39 In the early 2000s Brazilian media widely publicised high-profile scandals in which prominent Evangelical church leaders were implicated in financial crimes including tax evasion and illegal capital flight.

40 ‘nepotism’: a common local trope used by my informants, referring to an inherited, supposedly endemic way in which Brazilians relate to one another by seeking special individual treatment. See DaMatta, Roberto, Carnivals, Rogues, and Heroes: An Interpretation of the Brazilian Dilemma (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, [1979] 1991), pp. 133–4Google Scholar. Among other things, personalismo refers to a way for people to get things done through appealing in a personal, emotional way to the sympathies of others who can help them bypass norms and regulations.

41 ‘The work of God’ is a phrase of diverse, longstanding importance in many forms of Christianity, preceding by more than a millennium its use in Pentecostalism or in the CCB. I highlight in this paper only the vernacular ways that the phrase is used within the CCB, as inherited from the scant writings and preaching of Louis Francescon.

42 Congregação Cristã no Brasil, Resumo da convenção: realizada em fevereiro de 1936. Reuniões e ensinamentos: realizada em março de 1948. Pontos de doutrina e da fé que uma vez foi dada aos santos (São Paulo: Congregação Cristã no Brasil [1948] 1998), Article 25Google Scholar.

43 Latour, Bruno, We have never been Modern (Boston, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993)Google Scholar.

44 Ibid., p. 33.

45 For a helpful discussion of instrumental understandings for the growth of Pentecostalism in Latin America, and their implications for analysis, see Smilde, David, ‘Skirting the Instrumental Paradox: Intentional Belief through Narrative in Latin American Pentecostalism’, Qualitative Sociology, 26: 3 (2003), pp. 313–29CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

46 Martin, Tongues of Fire.

47 Meyer, Birgit, ‘Aesthetics of Persuasion: Global Christianity and Pentecostalism's Sensational Forms’, The South Atlantic Quarterly, 109: 4 (2010), pp. 741–64CrossRefGoogle Scholar.