A defesa das religiões de comunidades tradicionais de terreiro: os desafios da luta contra as formas de intolerância religiosa

Abstract

Due to the constant reports by the national media of attacks on the terreiros and practitioners of the traditional terreiro communities, the present work aims to analyze how the people of santo have been resisting the process of violence, that is, the actions of people or organizations connected to traditional religions of terreiros and their attitudes towards intolerant attacks against traditional religions of terreiro. In other words, we will verify the processes of resistance of the holy people to violent acts committed against their faith. Thus, our research sought to identify, based on the realization of semi-structured interviews and in a qualitative way (with leaders, assistants and attendees of the respective religions), the construction of resistance in the face of acts that reduce their faith to charms, charlatanisms or, yet, to pure demonization and aversion to elements that resemble or refer to faith, which, according to their persecutors, lead people away from the “truth”. Through the analysis of the interviews, we found the existence of a constant reaction and non-conformity in the face of intolerant attacks, and of attitudes that signal the struggle for justice, out of respect for religious freedom. Such resistance actions are based on the strength of the faith of the traditional terreiro religions and on the realization that many of the attacks and violence of these acts are the result of one of the facets of Brazilian racism, that is, religious racism.