Ministry in Brazilian Slums

Evangelical drug traffickers?  Yes.  You'll find them in Brazil.

Evangelical Christianity has been booming in Brazil for the past couple of decades.  It takes a myriad of forms, from staid traditional paths to neo-pentecostal to pseudo-New Age, and everything in between.  It's popular religion at its best and its worst, and it can be found on every level of Brazilian society, including the bottommost rungs.

During my "mission internship" in Brazil in 1997 I spent a couple of weeks, out of the two months total, in a rough neighborhood.  It wasn't a favela, but it was dangerous.  Just a couple of weeks prior to my arrival the teenage son of my host family there had been kidnapped, along with a friend from church, as they sat in a car outside the house one night.  They were kept for a day or so and then released, relieved of what little money they had and their sneakers.  Their families were too poor to afford any ransom, and killing them was apparently judged too much of a hassle.

The American missionary who was there at the time was a single man.  This was definitely for the better.  An American family in a neighborhood like that, with the husband/father going into some of the craziest situations you can imagine on a daily basis, is far from ideal.

This missionary got to know as many people as he could in the neighborhood, including the drug traffickers.  One day he and I were walking back to the church building from a neighborhood store when we came across several teenage boys hanging out on a corner.  They all said hello to my missionary friend and he introduced me.  After we passed he told me they were there to sell drugs.

Halfway down the street between my host family's house and the church building there was a bar.  One morning as I walked to the church building a man standing in the door of the bar asked if I had a "real" (a unit of Brazilian currency).  I simply replied "não" (need I translate?) and continued on my way.  When I mentioned it to the missionary, he looked alarmed and told me he'd be driving me back and forth from then on.  Later as he drove me home we slowed down in front of the bar.  He called out to the three men in the door.  They all waved and greeted him by name.  After we passed he explained that they were an assassin, a kidnapper and a lieutenant in the local drug trade.  He knew them and they knew him.  I was glad I didn't have to walk the two blocks between where I was staying and where the church met.

It could be that I've always lacked courage and a proper measure of faith.  That missionary was bold.  He even walked late at night with a young man to meet with a drug lord to pay a badly past-due debt on some drugs he was supposed to have sold but instead took for himself.  Bold.

When I read articles and see reports about ministry in Brazilian slums, I'm not usually very surprised by what I learn.  It really isn't news to me that there are "evangelical traffickers" who believe God's keeping them alive through countless encounters with the police, who kill and burn the bodies of their enemies but think they're doing good to be killing so few and who readily pray with a pastor in the street.

In the past week or so I've seen dismay expressed by some in a couple of online forums over this reality of life and ministry in Brazilian slums.  I'd just like to say that the religious leaders, whatever their faults and failings, aren't necessarily to blame for the lack of 100% repentance on the part of their motley flock.  They are facing incredibly difficult and perilous situations on a daily basis, armed only with a Bible and their faith.  Anyone who has been in regular ministry knows how long you can teach a specific point, only to find in the end that no one "got it."  How much harder ministering to drug-addicted grade school and high school drop-outs in a violent slum?

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See Also:

Brazil crime wars: Spiderman's story of drugs and Jesus in Rio's slums (The Guardian)

Pastor Kicked Out of Favela Home By Drug Traffickers (Igneous Quill)