Teologia da prosperidade e politica no Brasil a partir do século XX do pentecostalismo aos batistas tradicionais no sudoeste baiano

Abstract

The present work deals with prosperity and political theology in Brazil from the 20th century, with emphasis on Pentecostal, neo-Pentecostal and traditional Baptist religious matrices in southwestern Bahia. Initially, the beginnings of Christianity, the emergence of the Church, the Protestant Reformation and the expansion in England, the United States of America and the arrival in Brazil were presented. The first Protestant strands in Brazil, called invasion, history, mission and immigration, have been described. Prosperity theology and politics were studied with the rise of religious leaders to political power. Prosperity theology is considered an accommodation of the Christian faith to the capitalist ideal of physical and material prosperity and is supported by the neo-Pentecostal movement that arrived in Brazil in the late 1970s and that quickly expanded throughout the country. Affiliated to the Pentecostal and neo-Pentecostal denominations are many of the politicians of evangelical confession in the National Congress, who form the Evangelical Bench, with a majority originating from the Universal churches of the Kingdom of God and Assembly of God, the rest being from several other denominations. The Pentecostal and neo-Pentecostal movement was studied in their respective phases, and how it expanded through the peripheral regions of Brazil, a situation also verified in southwestern Bahia. Complementing the studies with the traditional historical Baptist Denomination, these strands were presented in order to verify the dynamics of relations between churches linked to the traditional, Pentecostal and neo-Pentecostal movements with regard to institutional political representation and indoctrination linked to prosperity. In the structure of the Baptist Denomination, the Associação Batista do Sudoeste da Bahia (Baptist Association of Southwest Bahia) – ABASB, located in Vitória da Conquista - Ba, southwest of the state, was chosen. A qualitative, quantitative and descriptive historical methodology was used with some comparative actions in relation to the categories in which Brazilian Protestantism presents itself, with bibliographic and iconographic sources and procedures subsidized by semi-structured questionnaires with open and objective questions. The results show that Baptists do not agree with prosperity theology, continue to defend the separation between Church and State, do not use the pulpit as a political platform, although they recognize the freedom of their adherents to apply for the political election they deem necessary.