Brazil Archives

Rise in police killings worry the Church leaders in Brazil

New statistics show the number of violent deaths in Brazil fell by 11 percent in 2018; however, the total number of homicides were still an astounding 57,341. Moreover, over 10 percent of homicides – 6,220 of them – were perpetrated by the police, a rise of 19.6 percent compared to the previous year.

New report on Amazon mafias draws on church-collected data on rural violence

A new Human Rights Watch report, titled “Rainforest Mafias,” draws on data collected by the Pastoral Land Commission, a non-profit group founded by progressive sectors of the Brazilian Catholic Church which has issued an annual report on human rights violations in rural sectors of the country since 1985.

Women play outsized role in missionary activity in Amazon
- Church in the Americas
- Sep 9, 2019
The suggestion of a need to identify the “type of official ministry that can be conferred on women” included in the working document of the upcoming Synod for the Pan-Amazon region has been controversial, but Bishop Adriano Ciocca Vasino of the Territorial Prelature of São Félix in Brazil thinks the document is “timid” about the role of the women in the region, which he says “in many communities is already diaconal.”
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Catholics denounce attacks against Brazil’s indigenous peoples in Amazon
- Catholic News Service, Church in the Americas
- Sep 4, 2019
After denouncing the record number of wildfires in the Amazon in August and the growing deforestation of the region, the Brazilian Catholic Church is pressuring the government to guarantee the safety of several Amazonian indigenous peoples, alerting the authorities of the imminent risk of genocide in northern Brazil.
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Evangelical missions a major threat to Amazon culture, Catholic leaders say
- Church in the Americas
- Sep 3, 2019
As the Synod for the Amazon approaches, Church leaders in the region want to speak about the growing influence of Evangelical and Pentecostal denominations among indigenous peoples.
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