Former Brazilian Socialist President Lula Visits World Council of Churches in Geneva
By Julio Severo
In visit to the World Council of Churches (WCC), former Brazilian Socialist President Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva was received by the WCC general secretary Rev. Dr. Olav Fykse Tveit and Rev. Dr Martin Junge, general secretary of the Lutheran World Federation. Tveit welcomed Lula at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland on 6 March 2020.
In Geneva Lula also met representatives of the World Communion of Reformed Churches, made up of Presbyterian churches.
Lula has been closely linked to the ecumenical groups in Brazil. Addressing the World Council of Churches’ 9th Assembly in 2006 in Porto Alegre, Brazil, he expressed special gratitude for the WCC’s welcome of Paulo Freire, a Brazilian “educator” known by a socialist educational method. What few people know is that Freire plagiarized the Bible-based method of the U.S. Protestant missionary Frank Charles Laubach (1884–1970).
Being considered a political “refugee” by WCC after his exile from the military rule in Brazil, Freire joined the WCC staff in Geneva as a consultant.
Geneva is the city of John Calvin, the founder of Calvinism. It is virtually the spiritual capital of Calvinism. It is also one of the capitals of traditional Protestantism. Today, it is a capital of ecumenical and socialist Protestantism.
Lula knows that he cannot defeat charismatic and Pentecostal Christians, who because of their fierce opposition to abortion and homosexuality have supported Brazilian right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro. Charismatics and Pentecostals are the majority of Protestants in Brazil.
Lula has a history of support of sodomy. Under his administration, Brazil was the first nation in the world to introduce in the United Nations a resolution treating homosexuality as an unalienable human right in 2004, while I campaigned against such resolution. So no real Christian could ever support him, even though Christians are free to pray for him and preach the Gospel to him.
Lula was condemned for several crimes. His place is in jail, not free to deceive.
Even though the main Christian support for Lula comes from Catholicism, Protestant support for Lula comes especially from mainline Protestant churches, which are a minority in Brazil. These churches are mostly ecumenical and socialist.
The Brazilian picture where most mainline Protestant churches support Lula and most charismatic and Pentecostal churches support right-wing Bolsonaro is explained by a new survey from LifeWay Research, which showed that Pentecostal Christians are much more conservative than traditional Protestant Christians.
Walter Altmann, a WCC official, has complained about my effort to expose his socialist activism. He, a traditional Protestant theologian. Me, a charismatic evangelical! So the results of the survey of LifeWay Research are absolutely right.
The Brazilian ecumenical denominations affiliated to WCC are:
* Episcopal Anglican Church of Brazil
* Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil
* Independent Presbyterian Church of Brazil
* Methodist Church in Brazil
* United Presbyterian Church of Brazil
CONIC is also affiliated to WCC.
Only WCC and Pope Francis, whom Lula met in his international trip, can politically “save” Lula, because charismatic Christians will keep praying for him — and exposing his wicked deeds, and the wicked deeds of his supporters, including WCC.