Brazil's evangelicals gain clout, close to electing first president

[Zorro]

Source: Reuters

Brazil's increasingly powerful evangelical Christians are tantalizingly close to electing one of their own as president next month in what would be a historic shift for the world's largest Catholic nation.

Marina Silva, an environmentalist running neck and neck in polls with incumbent President Dilma Rousseff, is a Pentecostal Christian who often invokes God on the campaign trail and has said she sometimes consults the Bible for inspiration when making important political decisions.

Some 65 percent of Brazil's 200 million people are Roman Catholics but evangelicals are rapidly gaining followers and power.

They grew from 5 percent of the population in 1970 to more than 22 percent in 2010 and the trend has continued. Evangelical groups have made particular inroads among urban working Brazilians who benefited from economic prosperity over the last two decades and are now demanding a greater say in politics.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/brazils-evangelicals-gain-clout-close-electing-first-president-163454457.html

[alfredo]

1. I hope they don't emulate our southern evangelicals.

[geek tragedy]

8. Silva is a socialist and a green.

And a person of color.

So, nothing like ours.

[alfredo]

10. That is encouraging.

[snooper2]

11. So she thinks the World is 4.6 Billion years old not 4600 right?

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. I think so, but her religious stances do seem to be a topic of controversy

Others have assailed Silva as a creationist, revealing the tensions over the influence of evangelical politicians and prompting rebukes by Silva.

“I am not a creationist,” Silva has told a panel of Brazilian journalists. “But I don’t need to scientifically justify my faith. I believe that God created all things, including the great contribution given by Darwin.”

“It is absurd to think that Marina could put Brazil on a fundamentalist path,” said Valnice Milhomens, an evangelical leader. “Marina never even joined the evangelical bloc,” she added, referring to evangelical legislators in Congress who often veer to the right on social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage.

This reluctance has exposed fissures in Silva’s campaign. After facing criticism from some evangelical leaders over her support for same-sex marriage, she backtracked this month, saying she supported civil unions instead. (The council overseeing Brazil’s judiciary has already opened the way for gay couples to marry.)

Read more at: http://www.livemint.com/Politics/rmrXcUEZZNitnf0CAcP3hP/Challenger-Marina-Silva-upends-Brazilian-presidential-race.html?utm_source=copy

[geek tragedy]

13. She thinks the rainforest and indigenous peoples

need to be protected against greedy developers and illegal logging.

[snooper2]

14. Well that is a good thing, I usually use that question to judge a persons intelligence

Regardless of the topic, if someone thinks that planet Earth is thousands of years old they are pretty much guaranteed to be a fucking idiot or at best a simplistic simpleton.

[geek tragedy]

17. Read up on her. That's not her.

Also, Latin American Catholics aren't any more liberal on social issues .

[Dawson Leery]

2. Go Rouseff!

Do not trust Evangelicals for anything.

[Judi Lynn]

3. Maybe she can "speak in tongues" during her first Presidential address. Hallelujah.

It might be a matter of years before the Snake Handlers, the more rustic branch of this church pitches its tent in Brazil!

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[EEO]

4. Not good.

I often think religion is the equivalent of a Blue Screen of Death on a PC. Evangelical Christianity is most of our Blue Screen of Death in the United States.

[Android3.14]

7. Should be a t-shirt

Religion is the Blue Screen of Death for an otherwise working government

[blkmusclmachine]

5. Will Diebold be "counting" the votes???

[geek tragedy]

6. She does not worship money.

She is one of the most globally important environmental activists. I hope she wins.

[theHandpuppet]

9. Doesn't Jimmy Carter consider himself an evangelical?

I thought he had mentioned that not long ago.

[Leontius]

15. some people just can't get over having a response when the bell rings.

[Arugula Latte]

19. Is that supposed to make Evangelicalism a good thing or something?

You are familiar with the disastrous effects these people have had on our own country, no? And consulting a freaky-ass book of primitive mythology for guidance, well, that's just pathetic in the year 2014.

on edit: The Catholic doctrine sucks, too. Misogyny, homophobia, no birth control, etc.

[closeupready]

16. Well they already marred their skyline with that silly statue.

I guess next up will be demands or laws mandating more modest attire during Carnival...

[Bacchus4.0]

18. Marina Silva, the evangelical, is the socialist party candidate n/t

[JI7]

20. so she is like Jimmy Carter ?