Jose Carlos de Souza, an unemployed Rio resident, credited the Universal Church with tugging him away from compulsive gambling and providing him a purpose in life. And their appeal goes beyond the poor. The Universal Church tends to focus on Brazil's lower economic classes, but numerous other prosperity churches have blossomed among the upper middle class and the wealthy. At those churches, members occasionally give thousands of dollars at a time in offerings. People turn over their cars as gifts to the Lord.
Women drop gold necklaces into collection bags.
She abandoned them both a year ago, she said, weary of their emphasis on money. Prosperity theology emerged during the early 1990s in Brazil, after a dismal decade marked by political instability, hyperinflation, stubborn unemployment and other economic ills. There were old women and young men. Worshipers wore jeans and simple dresses. The women wore no makeup and little jewelry.