Membership in a Pentacostal church gives discipline and opportunities for self-expression to individuals who urgently need both.
Illness is seen to have both natural and spiritual causes.
While the poor often have little remedy for the former, they can address the latter in the religious community, through the laying on of hands and constant prayer. Because worship is participatory and vocal, it is immediately accessible to the most marginal groups. Speaking in tongues permits 'a recovery of the spirit and voice by those previously voiceless and dispirited. This religion can be propagated fairly easily among the poor because followership does not require a long period of training. Since many churches are autochtonous, there is often no national or international body to whom they are accountable.