Desmond Tutu, archbishop of Cape Town, said:
“There is nothing more political than to say
that religion has nothing to do with politics. “
So I wanted to talk about this complex relationship
between politics and religion, religion and politics.
And I say this from my evangelical “locus”.
I am an evangelical pastor.
And evangelicals are a voice in this polyphonic Brazil.
We talked,
and we started talking and talking loudly,
and this voice is being heard.
And that voice of evangelicals, thank God, is also multiple.
The voice of the Evangelical Church in Brazil is polyphonic.
And I speak of another place within the evangelical church,
of this tradition that is heir of the Protestant Reformation,
this movement of the 16th century,
in the context of hegemony of Roman Catholicism.
And it’s good for us to celebrate 500 years of reform
and look at the history of these 500 years of Protestantism
because “anyone who does not know history is doomed to repeat it,”
Edmund Burke, British philosopher.
And it seems to me that we are repeating history
by ignorance
of what was this movement there in the 16th century,
which came to be called the Protestant Reformation.
It was a time of one voice.
It was a time of a voice, which belonged to the Church,
the Roman Church,
who lent his power
to the Empire.
The clergy and the king,
the clergy and the Crown united,
created a structure of power
and left the people there on the ground,
having their faith and their experience of faith instrumentalized.
Pope Innocent III even said
that just as the Moon lends its brightness to the sun,
the king also receives his splendor from the Church.
The voice of the pope and the voice of the emperor
were practically the same voice.
It was a determined world understanding
by an orientation of perception of the truth,
a hierarchical orientation,
and that built that context.
But you know that when politics instrumentalises religion
or religion tries to instrumentalize politics,
both are lost.
This is what happened in the Middle Ages,
and you must know the old history and this phenomenon of indulgences,
when the Church began to charge to grant the forgiveness of sins.
It was common at the time to say that a coin that fell into the vault of the Church
was equivalent to a soul coming out of purgatory.
Trade with religion is a very old thing.
Whoever does not know history is doomed to repeat it.
Until the time comes when someone,
more precisely Martin Luther,
rises, 1517, October …
exactly the next month, where we will celebrate the 500 years of reform …
As a result of a historical process, Martin Luther becomes a symbol
and this event symbol of the Protestant Reformation
is the day when Luther posts at the gates of the cathedral of Wittenberg,
in Germany,
its 95 theses,
inviting the academic community and the religious, theologians,
to discuss the question of indulgences.
Luther deflagrates a religious movement initially.
He does not imagine, perhaps, the repercussion of what he was doing.
Until, in 1521, he is called to portray himself
because he questions the Church,
he questions the authority of the clergy, the pope, the sacrosanct Church,
and dares to claim that there is truth outside the bounds of the Church.
He dares to offer in his historical context another voice
which confronts the voice that was united
or uniting the clergy and the Crown.
Luther is called to portray himself in the Diet of Worms, and he said thus:
“I will not retract because no man should portray himself
if he needs it or demands that he deny his own conscience. “
From this arises, in the Protestant Reformation, the principle of freedom of conscience,
the freedom of conscience which also results in the affirmation
that every human being is responsible for himself before God
and that there is no intermediation whatsoever,
of nobody, of any institution and of nothing,
between the human person and God.
Human consciousness is responsible
and able and competent to hear the voice of God,
There is no longer the Church here in the middle.
And when Luther says this, when the Reformers speak this,
speak of freedom of conscience,
speak of the competence and responsibility of the person, the individual before God,
and when they say that the Church is not a mediator
of this religious experience or of that experience of faith,
of this experience of salvation,
Luther brings forth
more than a new religious consciousness.
He puts a seed that will bring forth
a new political consciousness.
For when the Church is the exclusive holder of the divine voice,
the social hierarchy is perceived as God,
the church
it’s the people.
But when the Reformers,
and I am using Luther’s name symbolically because there were several,
but when the Reformers said:
“No, every person, in free consciousness,
is responsible for responding to God, “
the hierarchy is changed.
Now it’s God,
the people
and the church
and the Crown.
This maxim that all power emanates from the people
and on behalf of the people should be exercised
is very closely related to this Protestant character.
The Church is no longer the guardian of my conscience.
The Church does not impose on me my confession of faith.
The Church no longer dictates my moral standard of behavior.
I am now responsible,
with my freedom of conscience,
I am responsible for responding to God as I can discern Him,
as I can perceive it,
how I can believe in him, or not believe.
This means that there is not only a religious revolution,
a political revolution,
but a thought revolution.
Riegel goes on to say that with Luther,
we have reached the age of freedom of the spirit
and that the revolution brought about by the Protestant Reformation
was the fundamental revolution.
Until we arrive in our days,
this understanding of a polyphonic society,
this understanding of a plural society,
this affirmation of a democratic society,
this posture of saying:
“No one dictates the rule for me without hearing a ‘I protest’,
nobody tells me how I should live and what I should believe,
without my asking. “
And the ideas that are presented to me and the proposals that are made to me,
or I appropriate them in my free conscience
and, from that moment on that I appropriate,
these ideas and these proposals become my
and then, from that moment, I am guided by my own consciousness,
although the ideas have come from other consciences,
but I am guided by my conscience because I am responsible.
This creates a new posture of civilization.
This creates a new social reality.
So, see how interesting,
anyone who does not know history is doomed to repeat it.
I think the Reformers must be turning around in the tomb,
in today’s religious Brazil.
Three examples …
This art exhibition of that bank in Porto Alegre,
that, for religious reasons, religious
he pushed the doors closed,
saying, “This is not art!”
This protest against this art exhibition I can not understand.
No matter what hurts my aesthetic sense,
my ethical sense, my religious sense.
I am a Protestant.
Everyone has the freedom to express what they believe, what they think
and live the way you want.
I would even admit that someone would protest
by the fact that a bank will make use of Rouanet Law,
What a shame,
but to protest an expression of art that hurts my conscience …
it makes no sense.
For 500 years there has been a shift in Western culture,
which brought the affirmation of freedom of conscience
and the responsibility of the individual.
For example, the play that was censored in the city of Jundaí,
now, recently,
“The Gospel According to Jesus, The Queen of Heaven,”
in which Jesus would be represented by a transgender woman …
the religious forces went there and said, “You can not! Censorship! Stop it!”
Where did that come from?
This is medieval!
This is an imposition of belief and morality.
It’s not Protestant at all.
This is medieval.
When, in the city of Rio de Janeiro,
there is the graffiti “Bible yes, Constitution no,”
This is medieval!
We are in a polyphonic society
because it is a society guided by free consciences,
and by free and responsible consciences,
and this society will be so healthy, so free,
the more possibilities that all voices will manifest themselves,
all the voices are heard,
all expressions of beliefs, of faith,
all moral expressions, all social construction proposals.
Therefore, every time someone comes to impose a pattern of belief,
of ideology, of political proposal,
morality, code of conduct,
free consciences will always say, “I protest!”
I am in a movement that protested 500 years ago,
and I hope that the re-reading
or at least knowledge of the Protestant Reformation
contribute to a polyphonic Brazil,
because, although questionable in terms of substance
or soil for religious experience,
for the construction of a just and egalitarian society,
yes the maximum is “Vox populi, vox Dei”,
“The voice of the people is the voice of God.”
Thank you very much.
(Applause)
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