Religião e capitalismo contemporâneo: elementos introdutórios sobre o papel ideológico das mídias neopentecostais na reprodução das relações sociais capitalistas no Brasil (2021 e 2024)

Abstract

This research was conducted with the aim of studying the ideological representations disseminated by the neo-Pentecostal churches Universal Church of the Kingdom of God and International Church of God's Grace through their social media platforms, and their role in the processes of naturalizing social inequalities and mystifying the consciousness of social classes, particularly the working class, within the context of the reproduction of contemporary Brazilian capitalism, during the years 2021 and 2024. It examines the content of these representations from the perspective of the critique of political economy, based on the categories of alienation, wage labor, exploitation, pauperism, and social classes. The study is theoretically grounded in Marx's work and the Marxist tradition, especially the contributions of Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx (2007), Karl Marx (2004; 2010), and György Lukács (1969). It adopts a qualitative, documentary, and bibliographic approach, employing content analysis of twelve worship services broadcast on YouTube by the two selected churches. In the final considerations, we argue that the ideological representations disseminated through the social media of the churches analyzed mystify the conceptions and worldview of their followers as a whole, particularly affecting the working class, by interpreting alienation, exploitation, and pauperism as spiritual trials and individual curses, thereby shifting misery and poverty from the realm of the social relations of production and the material reproduction of life to the individual and transcendent realm. We further maintain that the effective overcoming of this mystification does not occur through an enlightened critique of its ideological content, but rather through the practical transformation of the material relations of economic exploitation of labor that make it socially necessary, that is, through class struggle.