January 3, 2026 – This documentary highlights a rapid expansion of evangelical Christianity in the past 40 years in Brazil, and how that has reshaped national politics, culminating in the rise of Jair Bolsonaro in 2019.

The documentary points out the troubling parallels between the political careers of Donald Trump, and Bolsonaro, who seems to have copied Trump tactics, right down to attacking the courts, democracy and journalists. Like Trump, he tried to overturn the results of the presidential election of 2022 by denying he lost and unleashing a mob on the national capital. Like Trump, Bolsonaro enjoys strong support from evangelical Christians.

According to the movie, “Evangelicals have grown from five [%] to more than 30% of Brazil's population. What is taking place here is one of the fastest religious shifts in human history.” Influential evangelical leaders backed Bolsonaro. In turn, religious leaders gained high level access to influence the government. The goal is Christian nationalism, a kind of theocracy.

Bolsonaro was beaten in 2022 by a former political prisoner, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Lula has a theory about the attraction of evangelical leaders like Bolsonaro, he said:

“When I was a trade union leader ... and a worker is unemployed. He goes to the union. And the union keeps saying, look, man, we need to get organized in the factory. You know, especially when we're organized, we're going to have to strike, fight and protest, because that's the only way to stand up against capitalism and everything it stands for. So when the guy says, damn it, I only came here because I lost my job, and now this guy wants me to start a revolution?”

“And then the guy leaves the union and goes to the Catholic Church. And when he walks in, the priest says, 'Yes my son, you must suffer on Earth to gain the kingdom of heaven.' That's life. Heaven belongs to the poor. Yada-yada. So the guy's like, 'Damn it, I came here to say I'm unemployed.'”

“And then the guy, desperate, turns to the church that preaches prosperity theology. And then the guy hears two things: The problem is the devil and the solution is Jesus. It's so simple. You're unemployed because the devil has entered your life. But Jesus will fix it for you. And the guy leaves feeling so good, thinking, 'Damn, someone finally told me I have a chance.'”

“My theory is that what led to the failure of socialism was its rejection of religion, ” Lula concluded. In order to get elected, Lula felt he had to publicly oppose the idea of unisex bathrooms and had to support anti-abortion laws in order to reassure the religious right.

The movie indicates the 2022 presidential election in Brazil was very close, Bolsonaro denied that he had lost, which led to his followers attacking national government buildings. He hurt his own cause, however, by fleeing the country, and going to the United States for more than a month. Perhaps if he had stayed, he might have succeeded in staying in power if he had the backing of the military, which he apparently did not. Bolsonaro's followers tried to persuade the Brazilian military to put Bolsonaro back in power, and that did not happen.

The parallels between the political careers of Trump and Bolsonaro are quite evident, even though Trump is barely mentioned in the movie, despite the fact that Trump imposed heavy tariffs on Brazil because of what he said was Brazil's unfair treatment of Bolsonaro, who has been sentenced to prison for crimes, including corruption.

Both Bolsonaro and Trump, and their evangelical followers have put a tremendous strain on the democratic institutions of both Brzazil and the United States. In some respects, the legal institutions of Brazil have held up better than the U.S., because Bolsonaro is not above the law, and Trump is, at least so far. This movie rates a B.

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Copyright © 2026 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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