Born Again in Brazil - The Pentecostal Boom and the Pathogens of Poverty

A spiritual revolution is transforming the religious landscape of Latin America. Evangelical Protestantism, particularly Pentecostalism, has replaced Catholicism as the leading religion in thousands of barrios on the urban periphery. But in few Latin American nations have Protestants multiplied as rapidly as in Brazil. What accounts for this rise? Combining historical, political, and ethnographic research, R. Andrew Chestnut shows that the relationship between faith healing and illness in the conversion process is integral to the popularity of Pentecostalism among Brazil's poor.

List of contents

Acknowledgments
Part I. The Spirit of Brazil
1. A Prophetic History
Part II. Exorcising the Demons of Poverty
2. The Preconversion World of Illness
3. Conversion: Crisis, Cure, and Affiliation
4. Health Maintenance: Spiritual Ecstasy and Mutual Aid
5. Health Maintenance through Ideology and Morality
Part III. The Church as Institution
6. Authoritarian Assembly: Church Organization
7. From the Assembly of Saints to the Legislative Assembly: Pentecostal Politics in Para
Conclusion
Notes
References
Index

About the author

R. ANDREW CHESNUT received his Ph.D. in Latin American history at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is currently a lecturer there.

Product details

• Authors: R Andrew Chesnut, R. Andrew Chesnut
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Behalf of Rutgers Univ Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 01.08.1997
• EAN: 9780813524061
• ISBN: 978-0-8135-2406-1
• No. of pages: 218
• Dimensions: 150 mm x 226 mm x 18 mm
• Weight: 295 g
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Religion/theology > Christianity; Social sciences, law, business > Sociology > Sociological theories