Coronavirus: 

Trump and religious right rely on faith, not science

 March 29, 2020

Christian pastor Shawn Bolz has recently said the U.S. economy would surge despite the conronavirus. He has said: ‘Even now several vaccines are coming out as well as a natural dying out of the virus itself.’ There is no known vaccine for COVID-19. He is pictured here at an event in April 2016. (Bolz Ministries)

As the coronavirus pandemic spreads globally, many governments have forbidden large gatherings. Some groups have been slow to heed the call, however.

This month in the United States, several neo-charismatic preachers decided not to cancel their church meetings and events. Some have since said they would move their meetings online.

Others appeared to minimize the physical health threats of the virus or emphasized how atonement, spiritual preparation or protection is strengthened through church tithing or donations.

These initial and ongoing response of some of these leaders have highlighted dangerous worldviews that stress the authority of Christian charismatic personal prophecy and sees in calamitous events signs of Christ’s final triumph.

Religious leaders emboldened by Trump?

According to religion researchers at the University of Southern California, Pentecostalism is the fastest growing religious movement in the world. The neo-charismatic movement is often referred to as the “third wave” of Pentecostalism. In this movement, evangelical churches which are not part of the established Pentecostal tradition, embrace the “Pentecostal experience,” distinguished by its emotional expressiveness, spontaneity in worship, speaking or praying in “unknown tongues” and healing. Participants often characterize themselves as “spirit-filled” Christians.

As the number of coronavirus infections grows in the U.S., ideas advanced by neo-charismatic leaders may have dire consequences.

Some of these religious leaders may become more emboldened by President Donald Trump’s recent comments. Trump said he wanted to have the U.S. economy back on track and Christian churches packed on Easter, before reluctantly taking the advice of U.S. health officials and extending social isolation at least through the month of April. Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer called this vision of Americans in churches an “American resurrection.”

Some of the neo-charismastic leaders may be increasing public tolerance for Trump’s approach. Others have echoed Trump — including an editorial in the Wall Street Journal — and have suggested the economy should be the top priority.

Meanwhile, among other religious leaders, the president’s desire for “packed churches” at Easter prompted widespread criticism, with the executive director of Massachusetts Council of Churches saying the president is “co-opting Easter for capitalism.”
Defying social distancing directives

In early March, L.A.-based Christian pastor Shawn Bolz, who has almost 50,000 twitter followers, told Fox News the “Lord showed me the end of the coronavirus.” On his Facebook page, Bolz wrote that several vaccines are coming out. There is currently no vaccine for COVID-19.

Bolz also recently claimed on a Christian website that the economy would surge, that Donald Trump would win another electoral term, that “God’s going to turn the tide of this thing” and the U.S. would “hit one of the greatest times … of economic stability.”

President Donald Trump has called for full churches at Easter. Here he is pictured at the White House with Cardinal Donald Wuerl, Pastor Jack Graham, Paula White-Cain and Vice President Mike Pence. AP Photo/Evan Vucci

On March 15, Rodney Howard-Browne, a Pentecostal pastor at the River at Tampa Bay Church, told his church to greet each other with a handshake, saying that his church would not close until the “Rapture,” or the meeting of all Christian believers with God in heaven.

Howard-Browne has shared anti-vaccination information on social media and has also circulated Trump’s comments regarding his hope to “pack the churches on Easter.”

Prosperity gospel preacher Kenneth Copeland told a Christian magazine that the fear of the coronavirus was a sin. He said when people fear they give the devil a pathway to their bodies.

On Twitter he told his 432,000 followers: “No weapon meant to hurt you will succeed … No disease. NO VIRUS. … Believe it. Receive it. Speak it in Jesus’ Name!”

Copeland, who is wealthy also told people to continue tithing to the church even if they lose their jobs due to the coronavirus.

When science prevailed

Florida-based Paula White-Cain, chair of the president’s evangelical advisory board and the person who prayed over President Trump before his swearing in addressed her many followers on March 17 regarding coronavirus in a Facebook update.

White-Cain asked viewers to spend 15 days at home physically distancing to help flatten the curve. But she also asked her followers to pray to be spiritually saved and to continue to support her ministry by giving a donation such as US$91. The figure of 91 recalls Psalm 91, a favoured text for the protection of believers in times of trouble.

Paula White-Cain, the religious advisor to President Trump, has so far advised her followers to stay home for 15 days. Here White-Cain is pictured at the benediction at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, in 2018. AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite

Initially, Guillermo Maldonado, pastor of a megachurch in Miami and has more than 100,000 Twitter followers, told his congregation on March 15 not give in to the “demonic spirit of fear,” of the coronavirus, to continue attending meetings and to not “heed warnings from officials to avoid crowded spaces.”

But Maldonado had a change of heart and on his blog writes that “safety is our No. 1 priority.” His ministry will now follow requests from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
A belief in supernatural abilities?

Mike Bickle, a Kansas City pastor, said in a YouTube sermon on March 22 that the virus is part of the enemy’s agenda — that enemy being Satan — to stop “stadium Christianity” in the U.S. and worldwide. Bickle said, “there are 20 stadium events planned in 2020 across our nation … and the enemy says, ‘Enough! I’m going to stop this!’”

These neo-charismatic leaders’ battle with the virus is one they consider to be “spiritual warfare,” where they confront and take authority over the “spirit of fear” and over the disease in the name of Jesus.

Some part of of their responses could be attributed to their “victorious eschatology.” This idea refers to the belief that the church will rise in victory before the return of Christ — something that would be heralded by apocalyptic signs.

In this context, these neo-charismatic leaders may believe Christians will be endowed with supernatural abilities, working miracles and healing people from diseases, also having the responsibility of converting souls to the Christian message.

Many of these preachers are writing end-time scenarios. There have been several scenarios presented which interpret stories from the Bible which they use as an authority and as a way to legitimize their beliefs — many of which could have deadly consequences.

Author

André Gagné
Associate Professor, Department of Theological Studies; Full Member of the Centre for the Study of Learning and Performance, Concordia University
Disclosure statement
André Gagné receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

 God in the Suburbs and Beyond: The Emergence of an Australian Megachurch and Denomination

Sam Hey

B Sc, Dip Ed (UTas), MA Theol (UQ)

2010

https://research-repository.griffith.edu.au/bitstream/handle/10072/365629/Hey_2011_02Thesis.pdf?sequence=1

Thesis abstract

The Pentecostal, charismatic and evangelical arms of Protestantism have provided some of the fastest growing segments of Christian religious activity in the United States, Australia and globally during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Much of this growth has been concentrated in a few very large megachurches (defined by scholars as churches with 2000 or more weekly attendees in one location) and new denominations formed as smaller churches became affiliated with them. Globally, the megachurch phenomenon is not exclusive to Pentecostalism. However, in Australia, almost all megachurch developments are Pentecostal, or charismatic and neo-Pentecostal offshoots. 

This dissertation examines the early life course biography of one of the first Australian megachurches, the Christian Outreach Centre (COC). It reviews events leading up to the founding of the COC in 1974 under a charismatic leader, and its growth and transition over its first 30 years and its development into a national and international denomination.

The thesis explores the COC’s development alongside other megachurches in Australia and specifically in Brisbane’s south east suburban ‘Bible belt’. It also investigates the COC’s capacity to establish itself in new locations within Australia and overseas. In addition, it examines the diversification of the COC as a provider of primary and secondary schools, tertiary education, counselling, political lobbying and social care activities.

The thesis proposes that the initial attraction of the COC megachurch and its affiliated churches reflected a market niche for a certain kind of religious experience, which was preserved through organizational development and response to social change in Australia during the late 20th century. 

It traces market opportunities for megachurch and denominational growth that arose because of increased tolerance of religious pluralism, suburbanization, generational change, inflexibility within traditional mainstream churches and acceptance of religious free market competition. 

The COC represents a local Australian expression of the global religious phenomena involving Pentecostalism and related late 20th century Christian revival movements and organisational developments. This thesis examines the features of Pentecostalism exemplified in the COC and assesses the contribution of the COC to the mission of Christianity and to the life of participants from critical, theological and social perspectives

PENTECOSTAL COLONIALISM

Botswana top court hears homosexuality appeal

Homosexuality is widely criminalised in sub-Saharan Africa 

Sandy Huffaker AFP/File

Issued on: 12/10/2021 

Gaborone (Botswana) (AFP)

Botswana's Court of Appeal on Tuesday started hearing a government attempt to overturn a landmark ruling that decriminalised homosexuality.

The country's High Court in 2019 ruled in favour of campaigners seeking to strike down prison sentences for same-sex relationships, declaring them unconstitutional.

The judgement was hailed internationally as a major victory for gay rights in the conservative Botswana.

But government wants the ruling overturned because it believes that courts have no jurisdiction to decriminaliase homosexuality.

"The court is not in a position to make such a finding," Sidney Pilane appearing for the government said.

"This is a policy matter. This can only be assessed by parliament."

Pilane bluntly told the court sitting in the capital Gaborone that "if gay rights were unconstitutional in the past they remain unconstitutional today".

Under the southern African country's 1965 penal code, homosexuality was punishable by a jail term of up to seven years.

But on June 11 2019, High Court Judge Michael Elburu declared "the time has come that private, same sexuality must be decriminalised."

Botswana is among a handful of countries in Africa, where social codes are often conservative, to have decriminalised homosexuality.

Others are Lesotho, Mozambique, Angola and the Seychelles.

South Africa is the sole nation on the African continent to allow gay marriage, which it legalised in 2006.

The Court of Appeal is expected to issue in a ruling in a matter of weeks after it wraps up the hearing.

© 2021 AFP

AFRICA S NEW BIG MAN RULE? PENTECOSTALISM AND …

https://gvpt.umd.edu/sites/gvpt.umd.edu/files/pubs/McCauley_Africa… · PDF file

pre-colonial norms, post-colonial institutions, and weak states created *John F. McCauley (mccauley@umd.edu) is Assistant Professor of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland, USA. An earlier version of the article was presented at the Nigeria Centre for Pentecostal and Charismatic Studies (NCPCS) Conference, Abuja, Nigeria, 2012.

Pentecostalism in Africa | David Duncombe

https://daveduncombe.wordpress.com/2012/12/12/pentecostalism-in-africa

2012-12-12 · Pentecostalism was in many ways a natural fit for the African culture. The pneumatological emphasis of Pentecostalism spoke to the spiritual holism of the African worldview. Africans expected a religion to heal the sick, offer protection from evil spirits, and provide help to the weak. Pentecostal Christianity offered to fulfill those expectations.

Rev. Raphael Warnock considers vote sacred as pastor and Senate candidate

Warnock is promoting his plans to address issues of the poor that he recalls from his days growing up as the 11th of 12 children of Pentecostal preachers in public housing in Savannah.

The Rev. Raphael Warnock has adopted a VOTE mask he uses when out talking with the community. Image courtesy of Rev. Warnock Flickr November 13, 2020

By Adelle M. Banks

(RNS) — Many clergy, having risen to occupy the pulpit once held by Martin Luther King Jr. and his father, “Daddy King,” might consider their careers made and not look beyond the Kings’ historic, 6,000-member Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. Many a politician, closing in on taking the top spot in a wide-open primary for a U.S. Senate seat, might take a few days before Election Day off from work to campaign.

Then there is the Rev. Raphael Warnock. In the days before Georgia voters gave Warnock, a Democrat, a seven-point victory and sent him into a runoff with GOP incumbent Sen. Kelly Loeffler, the pastor found time to participate in Ebenezer’s virtual worship services. In the prerecorded services, he immediately began cajoling viewers to get on social media to invite others to tune in.

“Maybe start a watch party,” he suggested, before making an announcement about free COVID-19 tests available on the church’s campus.

Warnock appeared online at his pulpit the following Sunday, looking crisp but relaxed behind “this sacred desk.” His runoff campaign was already underway, but he exuded the same ease he has shown over months of hard campaigning. (Inoculating himself against the kind of mudslinging Loeffler engaged in with her closest Republican rival, Doug Collins, in the primary, Warnock ran a parody negative ad against himself last week in which he admitted loving puppies.)

If the bald, bespectacled 51-year-old is conflicted about choosing between his prestigious pulpit or becoming Georgia’s first-ever African American senator, he doesn’t show it. Despite a direct question sent to his campaign by email, he hasn’t even made clear whether he will quit the job he has held since 2005 if he goes to Washington.

“It’s unusual for a pastor to get involved in something as messy as politics, but I see this as a continuation of a life of service: first as an agitator, then an advocate, and hopefully next as a legislator,” Warnock responded to Religion News Service on Wednesday through his campaign. “I say I’m stepping up to my next calling to serve, not stepping down from the pulpit.”

RELATED: Raphael Warnock, heir to MLK’s pulpit, heads for runoff for Georgia Senate seat

Indeed, it’s not always clear which role Warnock is inhabiting, pastor or politician. In church and on the campaign trail, he has compared voting to praying with stump-speech familiarity.

“We must vote because a vote is a kind of prayer about the kind of world that you want to live in,” he said at a Nov. 2 Democratic campaign rally in Atlanta before former President Obama took the stage.

Obama, who has spoken at Ebenezer, most recently at the funeral of U.S. Rep. John Lewis in July, praised Warnock at the rally for his 2014 arrest at a protest to expand Medicaid in Georgia.

Political and social engagement naturally comes with the pastor’s role at Ebenezer.

“King was deeply concerned about the issues facing everyday people,” said Marla Frederick, professor of religion and culture at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, recalling how the civil rights leader was assassinated as he made plans to march with sanitation workers seeking better wages.

“It’s the concerns about everyday people: living wages, access to health care, access to a good education, access to the democratic process, making sure that the democratic process is fair,” said Frederick. “Those are the types of things that King fought for. Those are the same types of things that Raphael Warnock wants to fight for in the Senate.”

These issues didn’t come to Warnock solely as part of King’s legacy but from his own experience as the 11th of 12 children of Pentecostal preachers, growing up in public housing in Savannah. He attended Morehouse College, King’s alma mater, starting on what Warnock called a “full faith scholarship” because he didn’t have sufficient funds. He then earned a master of divinity degree at Union Theological Seminary in New York in 1994.

As he pursued a doctoral degree, he served 10 years as a youth pastor and assistant minister at Abyssinian Baptist Church, one of New York’s most prominent Black churches, under Abyssinian’s longtime outspoken pastor, Calvin Butts. In 2001 he was called to lead Douglas Memorial Community Church, a 700-member congregation in West Baltimore. At 32, he urged the area’s clergy to be tested for AIDS to help remove its stigma and set a social justice agenda that included advocating for education.

The Rev. Raphael Warnock. Image courtesy of Rev. Warnock Flickr

At Ebenezer he has continued to pursue the problems that plague Black communities. A past social justice chair for the Progressive National Baptist Convention, he has represented the denomination in supporting Black farmers, advocating for prison reform and opposing Trump administration efforts to dismantle the Johnson Amendment, which prohibits explicit partisan activity by houses of worship.

On Juneteenth of 2019, Warnock and a group of interfaith partners launched the Multifaith Initiative to End Mass Incarceration in New York and Georgia. It is now expanding in other states.

“I believe that criminal justice is one of the unique areas where people on both sides of the aisle agree reform is desperately needed,” Warnock said.

Asked how he might help heal the country’s political and racial divisions, Warnock said his campaign was founded with a promise of “shared destiny” and unity.

“From day one, my campaign has been about representing all Georgians in the U.S. Senate, and that’s the kind of Senator I will be working with the Biden-Harris administration,” he told RNS. “We’re going to help our country live up to the highest meaning of its creed: equal protection under the law where everybody’s protected, where all of our children feel safe.”

An ally of the Black Lives Matter movement, he has tried to frame its goals as moral, not political. Since the pandemic closed his church, Warnock has opened the building to the public rarely, including for Lewis’ funeral and for that of Rayshard Brooks, a Black man fatally shot by a white Atlanta police officer. “Black Lives Matter is just a way of saying ‘see our humanity,'” he told those in attendance.

If he has gotten pushback for his progressive positions, said Justin Giboney, president of the AND Campaign, a nonpartisan think tank that promotes Christian civic engagement, it is from Georgia’s Black clergy. Some of his colleagues in the state, Giboney has heard, were disappointed that Warnock hasn’t challenged the Democrats’ broad support of abortion rights.

“I think if you talk to a lot of Black Christians there would be some distinction there,” Giboney said. “I think there would have been more pushback but for the Trump factor.”

Warnock, who has been endorsed by NARAL and Planned Parenthood Action Fund, pointed to his “lifelong work to protect and uplift human dignity,” including protecting women and families, and the racial divide in rates of maternal and infant mortality. “Black women are three times more likely to die as a result of childbirth,” he said. “People with any moral bearing should be deeply disturbed by that disparity.”

RELATED: Ebenezer pastor Raphael Warnock enters US Senate race

He also told RNS he wants to see the Senate pass the Equality Act, which features broad protections for the LGBTQ community with few exceptions for churches, charities and schools that object to same-sex marriage and homosexuality on religious grounds.

“Equality is a covenant that we share as Americans,” he said. “There is no such thing as equal rights for some.”

Rev. Raphael Warnock speaks to a crowd in Philadelphia after a Progressive National Baptist Convention march to the Liberty Bell. Warnock is the senior pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. Image courtesy of Gandhi Pinder

The Rev. T. DeWitt Smith, a former Progressive National Baptist Convention president, said Warnock’s stances on living wages, decent housing and voting rights will ensure that he will unite fellow clergy and his base alike. “I don’t think he would fumble the ball,” said Smith.

With Republicans’ options reduced to one candidate, Warnock now faces a tough battle in a state that gave Joe Biden an initial victory so narrow it has gone to a recount. And the negative campaigning has begun — Loeffler has raised an incident from 2002 when authorities accused Warnock of obstructing a child abuse investigation at a church camp. (“Law enforcement officials later apologized and praised him for his help in this investigation,” Warnock’s campaign told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution this week.)

As he headed to the runoff at the end of Election Day, Warnock expressed confidence in brighter days ahead — for his campaign and his state.

“Let us stick together, push through this dark night into the daybreak of a brand-new season,” he said. “The Bible tells us that ‘the light shines in the darkness. And the darkness cannot overcome it.’”

Appeals court upholds California order keeping places of worship closed

AMERICAN PROTESTANTS FORGET THEIR HISTORY
WORSHIP IN CHURCH IS PAPIST SAID CROMWELL
https://youtu.be/30wnEFouh5k
California Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom speaks on day three of the Democratic National Convention at Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on July 27, 2016. Hillary Clinton claims the Democratic Party's nomination for president. Photo by Ray Stubblebine/UPI | License Photo

May 24 (UPI) -- A federal court upheld California Gov. Gavin Newsom's restrictions on church services as part of the state's stay at home order as President Donald Trump has called governors throughout the country to reopen places of worship.

The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 to keep the provision of the order that keeps churches and other places of worship closed in place, denying a request by the Sout Bay United Pentecostal Church.
In their decision late Friday, Judges Jacqueline Nguyen and Barry Silverman wrote that the state's decision to close places of worship amid the COVID-19 pandemic does not "infringe upon or restrict practices because of their religious motivation" nor does it "impose burdens only on conduct motivated by religious belief" in a selective manner.

"We're dealing here with a highly contagious and often fatal disease for which there is presently no known cure," the judges wrote.

Judge Daniel Collins wrote a dissenting opinion stating that Newsom's order "illogically assumes that the very same people who cannot be trusted to follow the rules at their place of worship can be trusted to do so at their workplace."

The South Bay United Pentecostal Church filed an emergency motion on Saturday calling for the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the ruling.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday released guidelines for places of worship to reopen, including requiring that they provide hand sanitizer, encourage the use of facial coverings and enforce social distancing.

On Sunday, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said that he believes places of worship should be able to hold in-person services as long as they are taking "appropriate precautions."

"You sign up so that they don't get overcrowded. You get screened for temperature as well as symptoms as you come in, you socially distance among family units in the church," he said.

Trump on Friday identified churches, synagogues and mosques as "essential places that provide essential services, while also threatening he would override governors that do not take steps to reopen places of worship over the weekend.

PENTACOSTAL COLONIALISM
‘It’s not Satanism’: Zimbabwe church leaders preach vaccines
By FARAI MUTSAKAan hour ago


1 of 8

Members of an Apostolic Christian Church group gather for a prayer meeting on the outskirts of the capital Harare, Friday, Sept. 10, 2021. The Apostolic church is one of Zimbabwe's most skeptical groups when it comes to COVID-19 vaccines. Many of these Christian churches, which combine traditional beliefs with a Pentecostal doctrine, preach against modern medicine and demand followers seek healing or protection against disease through spiritual means like prayer and the use of holy water. To combat that, authorities have formed teams of campaigners who are also churchgoers to dispel misconceptions about the vaccines in their own churches.

(AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)

PHOTO ESSAY CLICK ABOVE

SEKE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Yvonne Binda stands in front of a church congregation, all in pristine white robes, and tells them not to believe what they’ve heard about COVID-19 vaccines.

“The vaccine is not linked to Satanism,” she says. The congregants, members of a Christian Apostolic church in the southern African nation of Zimbabwe, are unmoved. But when Binda, a vaccine campaigner and member of an Apostolic church herself, promises them soap, buckets and masks, there are enthusiastic shouts of “Amen!”

Apostolic groups that infuse traditional beliefs into a Pentecostal doctrine are among the most skeptical in Zimbabwe when it comes to COVID-19 vaccines, with an already strong mistrust of modern medicine. Many followers put faith in prayer, holy water and anointed stones to ward off disease or cure illnesses.

The congregants Binda addressed in the rural area of Seke sang about being protected by the holy spirit, but have at least acknowledged soap and masks as a defense against the coronavirus. Binda is trying to convince them to also get vaccinated — and that’s a tough sell.

Congregation leader Kudzanayi Mudzoki had to work hard to persuade his flock just to stay and listen to Binda speak about vaccines.

With La Luz del Mundo’s leader behind bars for sex abuse, will the Mexican church survive?


Alejandra Molina - Religion News Service

June 23, 2022

CHRISTIAN HIJABS

Women fill a section of stands at the Fairplex fairgrounds on Feb. 14, 2020, during the third and final day of La Luz del Mundo’s Holy Supper ceremony in Pomona, California. 

RNS photo by Alejandra Molina

LOS ANGELES (RNS) — As La Luz del Mundo leader Naasón Joaquín García was sentenced to nearly 17 years for sexually abusing young female followers, Jack Freeman — a spokesman and minister for the church — remained steadfast in his support for García as God’s elected.

“Even if the whole world would come against me, I would still declare with my faith. I am a Child of God and a believer of Apostle (Naason) Joaquin!” Freeman said on Twitter a day after García’s sentencing.

La Luz del Mundo leaders continue to maintain García’s innocence, even after he was called “evil,” a “monster” and the “Antichrist” in his sentencing by five young women he was charged with sexually abusing. The women urged the judge to impose a longer sentence than the 16 years and eight months he received.

His followers believe the claims of abuse are fabricated and his guilty plea is the result of a fraudulent justice system. García abruptly pleaded guilty just before his long-awaited trial was to start.

Church leaders have noted that their congregations continue to grow in the U.S., where a new house of worship was just inaugurated in Waukegan, Illinois, and as new members were baptized in a ceremony in Pachuca, a city in the Mexican state of Hidalgo.

In the church’s official statement, leaders say García, who goes by the title of apostle, is on a “path that God has placed in front of him for a reason, as he did for Apostle Paul.”

“The Apostle will continue ministering to the church,” they said.

Church leaders are going to reach for whatever biblical analogy they can to justify the situation, said Arlene Sánchez-Walsh, a professor of religious studies at Azusa Pacific University. “Because that shores up the true believers’ idea that this is a persecution,” she added.

“The church is going to say that they are persecuted, like the historic Christian church has been, tying their persecution complex to the biblical idea of persecuted leaders in jail, like Peter and Paul,” said Sánchez-Walsh, author of “Latino Pentecostal Identity: Evangelical Faith, Self, and Society.”

Sánchez-Walsh said the church could continue to move forward despite García’s imprisonment. If a church has a substantial base of true believers and money, “it has enough to keep going for as long as they want,” she said.

If a church has a substantial base of true believers and money, “it has enough to keep going for as long as they want,” she said.

As well, she noted, there’s just too much to lose in leaving a belief system in which followers have invested “a lot of time, money and emotional currency.”

“That’s incredibly difficult to do for any organization, particularly a religious organization that’s given you a worldview that says, ‘We are God’s chosen. We are led by God’s apostle. We are the true church,” Sánchez-Walsh added.

Headquartered in the Catholic stronghold of Guadalajara, Mexico, the tightknit Mexico-based Pentecostal movement claims 5 million worldwide followers. La Luz del Mundo temples are across the United States, with several in Southern California, predominantly in working-class Latino communities such as East Los Angeles, Huntington Park and San Bernardino.

La Luz del Mundo was founded in 1926 by García’s grandfather, Eusebio Joaquín González. The church rejects the concept of the Trinity and teaches that Jesus is God’s son and church leaders, like García, his father and grandfather, are his apostles.

In 2020, an ex-member sued the church and more than a dozen of its leaders, alleging decades of abuse at the hands of the group’s leaders. García’s father was the subject of child sex abuse allegations in 1997, but authorities in Mexico never filed criminal charges.

Followers of La Luz del Mundo don’t celebrate Christmas or Easter, but they do recognize the birthdays of García and the other apostles.

As a former pastor of La Luz del Mundo, Sergio Meza said he understands why congregants would choose to remain in the church.

Meza was labeled as no longer “being of God” when he left his pastoral position years ago in about 1986, and he said if church members decide to leave, “they have to be willing to lose their entire family, their husbands and wives, their children and parents — everyone.”

“As soon as you start to question, you are seen as the enemy of the apostle and of the church,” said Meza, 72, of Los Angeles.

Meza served as pastor in churches in East LA; in San Antonio and Houston; in Ensenada in Baja California; and in various parts of Mexico. Pastors are reassigned every two or three years, he said, causing his family to move often. He said he made no money as pastor and sold food on the street to make ends meet.

“As soon as you start to question, you are seen as the enemy of the apostle and of the church,” said Meza, 72, of Los Angeles.

He left the church for good in about 2000. Aside from his wife, children and grandchildren, he said he has no other family, considering that many of his nephews and cousins still remain in La Luz del Mundo. His family’s involvement in the church spans five generations, with his mother, a former Catholic, joining in 1950.

“I understand that leaving is not easy,” he said.

La Luz del Mundo leaders have not answered questions as to how García will minister from behind bars, but García has been reported as addressing his followers through letters he wrote as he awaited trial from his jail cell. In one letter, according to the BBC News, García wrote that he was fulfilling a “divine mission” by preaching to fellow prisoners.

“God’s plan is perfect, even though it is not always pleasant,” he said in the message read out at the 2019 Holy Supper gathering in Guadalajara.

Daniel Ramírez, a Claremont Graduate University associate professor of religion, said the letters García sends to congregations “are received like the epistles of Paul in the New Testament.”

“A lot of his epistles were sent by Paul from Roman jail, so the faithful receive it in that genre of apostolic exhortation,” said Ramírez, author of “Migrating Faith: Pentecostalism in the United States and Mexico in the Twentieth Century.”

“No matter where the letter was read, whether Chicago, Atlanta or elsewhere, it was received with great emotion, great joy, as word from God’s apostle on earth,” Ramírez added.

Ramírez said it’s not completely clear how García’s imprisonment could ultimately affect the state of the church, but he did note “an explosion of dissent of former Luz del Mundo members and victims, who have now been able to use this moment to expose everything.”

Ramírez said it’s not completely clear how García’s imprisonment could ultimately affect the state of the church, but he did note “an explosion of dissent of former Luz del Mundo members and victims...”

He said this may be an opportunity for ex-members to reach out to their loved ones who remain inside. “It may stymie future growth,” Ramírez said.

Ramírez noted some distinct differences from decades ago, when church membership grew after Mexican authorities failed to bring criminal charges against García’s father when he was accused of child sex abuse.

La Luz del Mundo’s followers saw those accusations as proof of discrimination against them by Mexico’s Catholic majority, who often refer to them derogatorily as a sect or cult. Ramírez said the group’s leaders have in the past used setbacks to their advantage.

Now, Ramírez said, it’ll be interesting to see how the younger generations, including those born in the U.S., react to these developments. They’re social-media savvy, Ramírez said, and “they can run around any kind of barriers of information.”

To Raquel Guerra, who grew up attending a La Luz del Mundo church in San Antonio, Texas, the majority of church members “are good people.”

“They just put their faith in the wrong person,” said Guerra, who blames the church leadership for “falsifying and twisting everything.”

She said many don’t believe the claims of abuse, partly because the women alleging the abuse are listed as Jane Does in court documents. While Guerra recognizes their names aren’t listed in order to protect them, she said others may not grasp that. Some simply think such claims are fabricated, she said. Still, Guerra said there are those who say that, even if Garcia is responsible for abuse, “we cannot judge him.”

“They just put their faith in the wrong person,” said Guerra, who blames the church leadership for “falsifying and twisting everything.”

To some, Guerra said, leaders like Garcia “are able to experience pleasure of all kinds because they’re sent by God.”

While Guerra said she didn’t directly see any sexual abuse while she was a part of the church, she became more aware of stories of abuse after leaving the church and connecting with other ex-members.

She left La Luz del Mundo at around age 19 because she was pregnant and in a relationship with a man who wasn’t part of the church. An insular community, the church frowned on relationships with outsiders, Guerra said. She recalls church leaders saying the child was a product of sin.

Guerra still has family in the church who have “received her with open arms, even knowing that they consider me an apostate.”

“There are still some good members out there who practice love instead of hatred as his doctrine teaches,” Guerra said.

‘A phantom plague’: Evangelicals who defied social distancing guidelines are dying of coronavirus in frightening numbers

PASSOVER IS ABOUT PLAGUE, PESTILENCE AND THE RETURN OF THE  ANGEL OF DEATH; AZAZEL

April 29, 2020 By Alex Henderson, AlterNet]

Countless non-fundamentalist churches in the United States, from Catholic to Lutheran and Episcopalian, have embraced social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic and temporarily moved their activities online. But many Christian fundamentalists and evangelicals have been irresponsibly downplaying the dangers of COVID-19 and doing so with deadly results: journalist Alex Woodward, in the U.K.-based Independent, reports that the pandemic has claimed the lives of more than 30 pastors in the Bible Belt.

“Dozens of pastors across the Bible Belt have succumbed to coronavirus after churches and televangelists played down the pandemic and actively encouraged churchgoers to flout self-distancing guidelines,” Woodward reports. “As many as 30 church leaders from the nation’s largest African-American Pentecostal denomination have now been confirmed to have died in the outbreak, as members defied public health warnings to avoid large gatherings to prevent transmitting the virus.”

Within Christianity, there are major differences between non-fundamentalist Mainline Protestant denominations such as the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church and fundamentalist Pentecostals. And Woodward, in The Independent, discusses the Pentecostals who have openly defied social distancing.
“The virus has had a wildly disproportionate impact among black congregations, many of which have relied on group worship,” Woodward explains. “Yet despite the climbing death toll, many US church leaders throughout the Bible Belt have not only continued to hold services, but have urged worshippers to continue paying tithes — including recent stimulus checks — to support their mission.”

One of the fundamentalists who defied social distancing, according to Woodward, was Bishop Gerald Glenn, founder of the New Deliverance Evangelistic Church in Chesterfield, Virginia. While other pastors were moving their sermons online, Glenn preached at a March 15 service that was attended by almost 200 people — and on April 14, CNN reported that Glenn had died of coronavirus.

Woodward points out that according to a recent poll by Religion News Service, 90% of congregations have suspended their in-person gatherings. But Woodward also notes that the survey “found that evangelicals were more likely to report worshipping in person.”

One of the far-right evangelical extremists who has encouraged worshippers to defy social distancing is Pastor Rodney Howard-Browne, a Pentecostal fundamentalist in Florida. Howard-Browne has irresponsibly described coronavirus as a “phantom plague” and was arrested for his blatant defiance of social distancing rules.

The Passover

https://www.bl.uk/learning/cult/inside/goldhaggadahstories/passover/thepassover.html

Enlarge

The heartless Pharaoh still refused to free the Israelite slaves. So God, brought about one last plague, which was so terrible that it was certain to persuade Pharaoh to let his slaves go.

That night, God sent the angel of death to kill the firstborn sons of the Egyptians. God told Moses to order the Israelite families to sacrifice a lamb and smear the blood on the door of their houses. In this way the angel would know to 'pass over' the houses of the Israelites. This is why the festival commemorating the escape from Egypt is known as Passover.

This image shows several scenes from Passover. On the right in a domed room, the angel of death is swinging his sword at a man in bed. On the left the Pharaoh and Queen are mourning the death of their first born son. Below is a funeral scene with six men carrying a firstborn's coffin.

Death angel” or “destroyer” or “destruction” in Exodus 12:23?“

In Exo. 12:12-13, it is written,

12 For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and I will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast, and I will execute judgment against all the gods of Egypt. I am Yahveh. 13 And the blood shall be your sign upon the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, then I will [וּפָסַחְתִּי] over you, and the destroyer’s plague shall not be among you when I smite the land of Egypt.

יב וְעָבַרְתִּי בְאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם בַּלַּיְלָה הַזֶּה וְהִכֵּיתִי כָל בְּכוֹר בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם מֵאָדָם וְעַד בְּהֵמָה וּבְכָל אֱלֹהֵי מִצְרַיִם אֶעֱשֶׂה שְׁפָטִים אֲנִי יַהְוֶה יג וְהָיָה הַדָּם לָכֶם לְאֹת עַל הַבָּתִּים אֲשֶׁר אַתֶּם שָׁם וְרָאִיתִי אֶת הַדָּם וּפָסַחְתִּי עֲלֵכֶם וְלֹא יִהְיֶה בָכֶם נֶגֶף לְמַשְׁחִית בְּהַכֹּתִי בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם

The narrative is a bit complex; however, the general idea is as follows. The Israelites sacrifice the Pesach offering.1 The blood of this Pesach offering is caught in a basin, and a bunch of hyssop is used to apply the blood to the lintel and two side-posts of the Israelite homes.2 Yahveh via Moses tells the Israelites that the blood applied to their door-posts in the specified manner will be “your sign” [לָכֶם לְאֹת].3 Yahveh sees this sign and does not allow the destroyer [מַשְׁחִית] to come unto their houses to plague the Israelites.4 The destroyer [הַמַשְׁחִית] is an entity that is to plague [לִנְגֹּף]5 with a plague [נֶגֶף]6 every firstborn in Egypt where Yahveh does not see the sign of the blood upon the door-posts. In fact, the plague is referred to as “the destroyer’s plague” [נֶגֶף לְמַשְׁחִית].7

Since it is written that Yahveh Himself will “pass through” (note: this is the verb עָבַר) the land of Egypt and smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, but this is actually accomplished via “the destroyer” which plagues the firstborn of Egypt with a plague, we can reasonably conclude that the destroyer is Yahveh’s agent of destruction. Yonatan ben Uzziel suspects as much, as he interpreted the Hebrew into Aramaic as מלאכא מחבלא (“the destroying angel”) in his targum.8

Therefore, we have Yahveh, and Yahveh’s destroyer. These are two separate entities. The latter is Yahveh’s agent which executes judgment upon Egypt and plagues the firstborn with the plague of death. A similar entity encountered in 1 Chr. 21:15 is referred to as “the destroying9 angel” [לַמַּלְאָךְ הַמַּשְׁחִית] and executes judgment and destruction at God’s behest.

Meredith G. Kline wrote,10



With that being said, it’s a bit easier to understand what is occurring during the final plague. As the destroyer is passing through Egypt, it is plaguing the firstborns with the plague of death, thus killing them. However, the destroyer is impeded from entering the houses of the Israelites only because Yahveh Himself sees the sign of the blood on their door-posts. When Yahveh sees this sign, He does not “pass over” the Israelites’ houses. If Yahveh were to simply pass over their houses, it would not impede the destroyer who could enter the houses after Yahveh passed over. (Therefore, the verb פָּסַח does not really mean “pass over” when translated into English.) Yahveh, upon seeing the sign of the blood upon the door-posts, then covers (or protects) these houses. When Yahveh covers the houses of the Israelites, the destroyer is not allowed to come unto the houses to plague the Israelites. Yahveh Himself is providing divine protection over these houses until all the firstborns of Egypt without divine protection have been plagued and killed by the destroyer.
References

Keil, Carl Friedrich. Commentary on the Old Testament. 1900. Reprint. Trans. Martin, James. Vol. 1. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986.

Kline, Meredith G. "The Feast of Cover-Over." Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society. 37/4 (1994): 497-510.
Footnotes

1 Exo. 12:28 cp. Exo. 12:6, 12:21

2 Exo. 12:28 cp. Exo. 12:7, 12:22

3 Exo. 12:23 cp. Exo. 12:13

4 Exo. 12:23 cp. Exo. 12:13

5 Exo. 12:23

6 Exo. 12:13

7 Exo. 12:13. Granted, Carl Friedrich Keil (p. 19) commented, "...there is no article with למשׁחית." He understands נֶגֶף לְמַשְׁחִית as meaning "plague to destroy." However, the article would be indicated by a dagesh (small dot) within the מ, like so מּ, and such [Masoretic] vowel pointing would not have been part of the original manuscript.

8 Targum of Yonatan ben Uzziel, Exo. 12:23

9 or "destroyer"

10 p. 499
https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/22444/death-angel-or-destroyer-or-destruction-in-exodus-1223

JEWISH VIRTUAL LIBRARY DEMONS AND DEMONOLOGY

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/demons-and-demonology

MAVET (Mawet), the ordinary Hebrew word for death, is also the proper name of a Canaanite underworld god (Mot), the enemy of Baal in a Ugaritic epic. The proper name, not the common noun, should probably be understood in Isaiah 28:15, 18: "We have made a covenant with Death," and Jeremiah 9:20 [Eng. 9:21]: "For Death is come up into our windows" (cf. Hos. 13:14; Job 18:13, "the firstborn of Death"; 28:22).

RESHEPH is another major god of the Canaanite religion who becomes a demonic figure in biblical literature. Resheph is known as the god of plague over much of the ancient Near East, in texts and artistic representations spanning more than a millennium from 1850 B.C.E. to 350 B.C.E. In Habakkuk 3:5, YHWH on the warpath is said to be preceded and followed by respectively Dever and Resheph. (This is similar to the picture of two divine attendants who escort major gods in ancient myths.) Just as some other names of deities are used as common nouns in biblical Hebrew (Dagon (dagon, "grain"); Ashtaroth (ashtarot, "increase [of the flock]"), etc.) so Reshef (reshef) has come to mean simply "plague" (Deut. 33:29; Ps. 78:48), and the fiery darts of the bow (Ps. 76:4 [Eng. 76:3]; Song 8:6), apparently from the common association of plagueand arrows.

DEVER ("Pestilence") is the other demonic herald who marches with YHWH to battle (Hab. 3:5). Dever is also mentioned in Psalms 91:5–6: "Thou shalt not be afraid for the Terror (Paḥad) by night; Nor for the Arrow (Ḥeẓ) that flieth by day; Nor for the Pestilence (Dever) that walketh in the darkness; Nor for the Destruction (Ketev) that wasteth at noonday." Not only Dever but also the other words italicized above have been plausibly identified as names of demons. The "Arrow" is a familiar symbol in folklore, for disease or sudden pain, and Ketev (Qetev; cf. Deut. 32:24; Isa. 28:2; Hos. 13:14) is in this instance the personification of overpowering noonday heat, known also to Greek and Roman demonology.

AZAZEL (ʿAzʾazel) occurs in the ritual for the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:8, 10, 26). Aaron casts lots over two goats, and the one "for ʿAzʾazel" is presented alive before the Lord, and then released into the wilderness. The ancient Greek and Latin versions understood ʿAzʾazel as "goat that departs," hence "the scapegoat" of some English versions. Most of the rabbinic commentators and some moderns take Azazel as the name of the place to which the goat is driven. The great majority of moderns regard Azazel as the personal name of a demon thought to live in the wilderness.

Aaron Seized the Angel of Death

Rabbi Moshe Ben-Chaim

http://www.mesora.org/korach-aaron-angel.html

As the Jews were now second guessing their accusation, but not completely abandoning this false view of Aaron and Moses, the plague stopped, but only temporarily, reflecting their temporal suspension of their accusation. We may interpret Aaron as “seizing the angel of death” as his correction the Jews’ error that Moses and Aaron were murderers. “Seizing the Angel of Death” means Aaron removed the cause of death in the remaining Jews; he corrected their false notions.

When they saw Aaron standing between the living and the dead with incense halting the plague, the Jews were confused. Aaron is Moses’ messenger, but the plague was clearly from God. So, how could Aaron and Moses overpower God? This is what Rashi means when metaphorically the Angel of Death tells Aaron, “I am the messenger of God, and you are (only) the messenger of Moses.” The Angel in this metaphor personifies the false opinions of the people, which caused death. But with a corrected opinion, God will not kill. So, the Angel talking in this metaphor represents the Jewish people’s corrupt opinion, which in fact causes death. (Sometimes, false views can be so wrong that the follower of such a view deserves death.)

Returning to the Rashi, Aaron replies to the Angel one last time, “Moses says nothing on his own accord, rather, (he says matters only) through God. If you do not believe me, behold Moses and God are at the Tent of Meeting, come with me and ask.” At this point, the plague was temporarily stopped, as the Jews were entertaining the idea that Moses and Aaron were not murderers, as Aaron was trying to keep them alive. Their perplexity about whether Aaron and Moses were following God had to be removed if they were to live permanently. This is what is meant that when Aaron returned to the tent of meeting (Num. 17:15) and the plague was terminated completely. As the Jews witnessed Aaron, Moses, and God “together” they now understood that Moses and Aaron were in fact followers of God. The metaphor depicts Aaron as “seizing” the corrupt views of the people which demanded their death, allegorized by seizing the “Angel of Death.”

This Rashi is yet another of literally thousands of examples where the Rabbis wrote in riddles, as King Solomon taught in Proverbs 1:6. We learn from King Solomon, to whom God gave knowledge miraculously (Kings I, 3:12) that riddles are a means of education. We must continue to look for the hidden meanings in the Rabbis’ words, which at first seem bizarre. We must not take amazing stories literally. There are no demons roaming the Earth, no angels of death, no powers of segulas that protect. God is the only power, and He created the Earth and heavens and all they behold, with distinct, limited physical properties and laws. Physical creation cannot exceed its design: a string dyed red does not suddenly get transformed into a device which wards off God’s punishments. It is unfortunate that we have become so idolatrous with red bendels.

What is worse, is that children are taught to accept superstitions. They become prime candidates for missionaries. Superstitious rearing teaches children that Christianity is no different.

This new mystical, pop-kabbalistic Judaism blurs the lines between true Torah principles and all other religions. When Jews fail to see the difference between a superstitious Judaism and other religions, they more easily convert. And they are accurate in this equation: there is no difference between a Judaism that preaches segulas, or that parts of God are “inside man,” and between Christianity that makes identical claims.

THE DESTROYING ANGEL

JEWISH BIBLE STUDIES
Vol. 42, No. 4, 2014 

https://jbqnew.jewishbible.org/assets/Uploads/424/jbq_424_bardestroyingangel.pdf

THE PLAGUES OF EGYPT
 The destroying angel seems to be alluded to in the Bible's description of the
slaying of the firstborn, where he is called ha-mashhit: for the Lord will pass
over the door and not let the Destroyer enter and smite your home
(Ex. 12:23). While is stated explicitly that the Lord passed through Egypt to
smite the firstborn (Ex. 12:12–13), and the text of the Passover Haggadah
expounds this to mean, "I and not an angel," verse 23 attests that the Lord
was accompanied by the destroying angel, whose nature is to strike down all
whom he encounters, unless – as here – the Lord restrains him. This seems to
be the intention of the Mekhilta's comment on verse 22, None of you shall go
outside the door of his house until morning: "This indicates that when the
destroying angel is given permission to do harm, he does not distinguish between the            righteous and the wicked."
The Psalmist's account of the plagues of Egypt (Ps. 78:49) indicates that the plagues           were inflicted by mishlahat malakhei ra'im – a band of deadly [lit. evil] angels. The             talmudic sages used the term mishlahat to describe a band of destructive creatures, specifically a wolf pack.
Kraus believes that this "band of evil angels" does not refer to the 
l"destroying angel" (mashhit) associated with the last plague (Ex. 12:23), but
to the demonic powers that the Lord dispatches with every affliction.
 It seems, then, that we must distinguish the "destroying angel," ha-mashhit,
from the messengers of death who come to punish individuals only. By contrast, the              Destroyer is sent by the Lord to kill multitudes through a plague.
Unlike the deadly messengers, who bring both natural and premature death,
the Destroyer inflicts only a premature, painful death. Still, this mashhit is

controlled by God.

PDF 

A Dictionary of Angels, including the fallen angels - Masada ...

https://masada.world › assets › angels

Angels bewailing the death of Jesus, a detail from a fresco by Giotto in the Arena Chapel, Padua. ... In Leviticus, he is Azazel, the "goat of the sin offering. ... plagues, fed hermits, helped plowmen, converted heathens. An angel ... damned, opened the door to a return of Satan to his archangelic perch in the Heavenly purlieus.

VIDEO
At a tense cabinet meeting on Saturday in the Brazilian president's official residence, Jair Bolsonaro found himself isolated. The far-right leader convened the emergency meeting in Brasilia's modernist Alvorada Palace to resolve a dispute with Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta, who publicly opposed the president's calls to loosen quarantine restrictions for Brazil's 210 million people.

Bolsonaro's disapproval rating rises amid virus havoc
AFP•April 3, 2020


Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro has faced nightly protests for weeks over his handling of the coronavirus crisis; he is pictured March 18, 2020 (AFP Photo/Sergio LIMA)

Rio de Janeiro (AFP) - Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's disapproval rating has surged as the far-right leader has taken a vocal stance against coronavirus containment measures, two polls out Friday found.

Bolsonaro, who has compared COVID-19 to a "bit of sniffles" and criticized the "hysteria" around it, has found himself increasingly isolated on the issue as the pandemic advances.

Thirty-nine percent of Brazilians disapprove of his handling of the crisis, up six points from two weeks ago, polling firm Datafolha found.

That was similar to the result reported by polling firm XP Ip Espe, which found Bolsonaro's disapproval rating hit its highest level since he took office in January 2019.

Forty-two percent of Brazilians said the president's overall performance was "bad" or "terrible," up six points in a month, it said.

Both polls found the president's approval rating was essentially stable: 33 percent, in the Datafolha poll, which asked specifically about his handling of the coronavirus pandemic; and 28 percent, according to XP, which focused on overall performance.

Those numbers were down two points in both cases, indicating the president retains a relatively stable core of support even as his disapproval ratings rise.

The polls, meanwhile, found a surge in approval for Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta, who has stood by international recommendations on taking aggressive measures to contain the new coronavirus, braving criticism from Bolsonaro.

Mandetta's approval rating leapt 21 points to 76 percent, Datafolha found.

Bolsonaro has faced nightly protests for weeks in some of Brazil's biggest cities for his handling of the coronavirus crisis. Confined residents bang pots and pans out their windows, shouting, "Get out, Bolsonaro!"

His criticism of containment measures such as closing businesses and schools has increasingly isolated him in Brazil and abroad.

State and local authorities have largely ignored him to follow World Health Organization advice on adopting social distancing measures as Brazil has emerged as the hardest-hit country in Latin America, with 359 deaths and 9,056 cases so far.

The Datafolha poll was conducted by cell phone from April 1 to 3 with 1,511 adults nationwide, with a margin of error of three percentage points.

The XP poll was conducted from March 30 to April 1 with 1,000 people nationwide, with a margin of error of 3.2 percentage points.

Brazil's Bolsonaro turns to prayer in coronavirus crisis

By Lisandra Paraguassu,Reuters•April 3, 2020

BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, agreeing to a request from evangelical Christians, said on Friday that he was calling for a national day of fasting and prayer this Sunday to "free Brazil from this evil" coronavirus epidemic.

As the death toll mounts in the country, along with criticism of his handling of the public health crisis, Bolsonaro met with Pentecostal evangelical pastors outside his official residence. Evangelicals have been among the right-wing leader's most faithful supporters.

"With the pastors and religious leaders we will call for a day of fasting by Brazilians so that Brazil can free itself from this evil as soon as possible," he later said on radio station Jovem Pan.

On Friday, the country's coronavirus deaths increased to 359 from 299, while confirmed cases jumped to 9,056.

Brazilians overwhelmingly disapprove of Bolsonaro for minimizing the epidemic and support governors and health officials that he has attacked for advocating social-distancing measures, two polls showed on Friday.

Bolsonaro has become increasingly isolated politically as he continues to rail against state and municipal shutdowns, calling them economically disastrous responses to an over-hyped risk.

The idea of fasting and prayer gained momentum on Friday among Bolsonaro supporters and evangelical preachers on social media.

"Brazil is in a serious crisis. The forces of evil are rising against a God-fearing Christian president and family defender. Sunday will be a day of fasting," Congressman Marco Feliciano, an evangelical pastor, said in a Twitter post.

Pastor Silas Malafaia, a leader of Brazil's largest Pentecostal church, the Assembly of God, proposed on social media that the fast begin at midnight on Saturday and last until midday Sunday.

Bolsonaro's approval rating has fallen to its lowest level since he took office last year. He was elected in a conservative swing by Brazilian voters, with massive evangelical support for his family values platform opposing abortion and gay marriage.

A former army captain turned politician, Bolsonaro was raised a Roman Catholic and was re-baptized by an evangelical pastor in the River Jordan in 2016 in Israel, as he began to plan a run for president.

(Reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu; writing by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Rosalba O'Brien)