Brazil’s Bolsonaro Administration Sees Catholic Church as Potential Opposition
By Julio
Severo
The Bolsonaro administration in Brazil
wants to restrain, according to Brazilian newspaper Estadão, what it considers
the opposition of the Catholic Church, in the vacuum of the defeat and loss of
the Workers’ Party and other left-wing parties. In the evaluation of officials
of President Jair Bolsonaro, the Catholic Church is a traditional ally of the
Workers’ Party (WP) and it is articulating itself to influence debates
previously dominated by WP in the countryside of Brazil and in suburbs.
“We are worried and we want to neutralize
it,” said Augusto Heleno, chief minister of the Institutional Security Office
(ISO), who heads the counter-offensive.
Based on documents circulating within the
Bolsonaro administration, the ISO’s military officials have judged that
left-leaning sectors of the Catholic Church, members of the so-called
“progressive clergy,” intend to take advantage of meetings with the pope to
criticize the Bolsonaro administration and get international impact.
“We think this is interference in Brazil’s
internal affairs,” said Heleno. As a reaction, ISO plans to involve, according
to Estadão, the Itamaraty [the Brazilian foreign affair ministry], which is
under the control of an olavete, to monitor Brazilian Catholic leaders during
their trips to the Vatican.
As soon as Abin’s first communication
reached the top officials of the Bolsonaro administration, generals immediately
made a connection with the criticism of the National Conference of Brazilian
Bishops (NCBB) to Bolsonaro during the election campaign. Groups linked to the
NCBB, such as the Indigenous Missionary Council and the Land Pastoral
Commission, spared no attacks, which continued after Bolsonaro’s election and
inauguration. All of them are historical allies of the Workers’ Party. The
Prison Pastoral, for example, issued a press release last week criticizing the
anticrime measures of the Minister of Justice, Sérgio Moro, who, as judge,
condemned former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the Car Washing
operation.
In the electoral campaign, Land Pastoral
issued a report by Bishop André de Witte of Bahia, who mentioned Bolsonaro as a
“real danger.” Bolsonaro’s support networks countered by spreading on the
internet that Pope Francisco was “communist.”
Although considering himself Catholic,
Bolsonaro was unable to obtain the support of the NCBB, which is Brazil’s
largest Catholic force, but invested heavily and incessantly in the support of
evangelicals, especially Rev. Silas Malafaia, during the elections.
However, after getting elected, he
abandoned his preference for evangelicals and opted for placing above
evangelicals militant olavetes, as adherents of astrologer Olavo de Carvalho
are called. Because of this change of preference, several ministries of great
importance became a source of jobs to olavetes, just as in the past they were a
source of jobs to socialist militants.
The only evangelical in high level in the
Bolsonaro administration is Pastor Damares Alves, who heads the Ministry of
Women, Family and Human Rights. But she, as an evangelical, is visibly disadvantaged
compared to the large number of olavetes in more important government
positions. It is a harmful disadvantage, on the part of the Bolsonaro
administration, as it goes directly against its evangelical voters, who are
seen by astrologer Carvalho as worse than Marxists, according to his statement
in September 2018.
The Bolsonaro administration and its
intelligence agencies, especially Abin, correctly analyzed when they saw the
Catholic Church as a potential opponent. There
is a Catholic tradition of connection to the left occurring not only in Brazil
but also throughout Latin America. The most Catholic countries in
Latin America are, coincidentally or not, also the most socialist. Cuba,
Venezuela and Bolivia are ultra-Catholic countries that have experienced a
strong leftist advance precisely because of leftist Catholic influence.
Brazil has not fallen into this
leftist-Catholic tradition because of the advance of evangelical churches,
which supported Bolsonaro because they saw conservative qualities in him,
especially in the issues of abortion and homosexuality, which are aligned with
their conservative, Bible-based views.
This conservative trend is by no means
unique to Brazil. It is seen throughout Latin America, where countries
influenced by evangelical conservatism lead their governments to move their
embassies to Jerusalem. A
major example is Guatemala, the first nation in Latin America, and the second
country in the world after the United States, to move its embassy to Jerusalem.
The president of Guatemala is evangelical and almost 50 percent of the
Guatemalan population today is evangelical. The more evangelical a country is,
the more conservative and pro-Israel it is.
Bolsonaro did very well by rejecting the
radicalism of left-wing Catholics, especially the NCBB.
Yet, by giving preference to olavetes, who
are syncretic Catholics who embrace a kind of esoteric fascism, to the
detriment of evangelicals who strongly supported him, Bolsonaro is playing a
strange game with his constituents. This game involves manipulation and
opportunism.
If it is not right to give preference to
evangelical supporters, why give preference to olavetes’
fascism, which defends the Inquisition, who tortured and killed Jews and
Protestants?
If Bolsonaro thought that astrologer Carvalho
was enough to elect him, why before the election did he give preference to
evangelicals? After his election was won, why did he change his stance, giving
preference to olavetes?
If it was not right for former socialist
presidents Lula and Dilma to turn the Brazilian government into a big source of
jobs for left-wing militants, why would it now be right to turn the Brazilian
government into a big source of jobs for olavete militants?
In addition, there is the problem of
external interference. Steve Bannon said last week that a senior Bolsonaro
government official “is not helpful and is unpleasant.” Such interference by
Bannon in Brazilian politics occurred after his
meeting with the astrologer Carvalho. Both Bannon and the Brazilian astrologer,
who is a self-exiled immigrant in the United States, are adherents of the
Islamic occultist René Guénon. Bannon, who became persona non grata
in the Trump administration and in the conservative mainstream media after
Trump expelled him from the White House, seeks to interfere in Brazil’s affairs
now that the Bolsonaro administration has given so much space and job
opportunities to olavetes.
If General Heleno thought that the
left-wing conduct of the NCBB and the Vatican “is interference in the internal
affairs of Brazil,” why think that the advance of esoteric fascism within the
Bolsonaro administration promoted by two adherents of an Islamic sorcerer would
be less interference?
You cannot have a healthy victory, in the
fight against the NCBB’s leftism, by choosing esoteric fascism. The only
healthy way to defeat the powerful Catholic left is to do what has been done
throughout Latin America by a majority of conservative evangelical churches:
Preach the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, healing the sick and casting out demons.
With information from Estadão.
Portuguese version of this article: Governo Bolsonaro vê Igreja Católica
como potencial opositora
Source:
Last
Days Watchman
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