RENDERS, Helmut. “The Wesleyan religio pectorum in its relation to the Brazilian `cordial´ religion: between the adaption to the dominant cultural matrix and the proposal of a thorough enculturation”. In: Methodist Review, Atlanta, Georgia, EUA, vol. 8
Disponível em: http://www.methodistreview.org/index.php/mr/article/view/111/128
Abstract
This article suggests an understanding of the major Brazilian Protestant
and Pentecos tal expressions of the religio cordis—the “re li gion of the heart”—
not pri mar ily on the ba sis of the Protestant the ol ogy or conceptuality, but
rather as a vari a tion of the cul tur ally es tab lished Cath o lic icono graphic lan -
guage of the “warmed heart,” char ac ter ized by a pro found mys ti cal em pha sis
and a lack of in ter est in any crit i cal en coun ter with the world in search for its
trans for ma tion. In the vast ma jor ity of its oc cur rences, the religio cordis
brasiliensis seems to be a re li gious ex pres sion and un der pin ning of the world
view of the “cor dial man,” a so cio log i cal type cre ated by Sérgio Buarque de
Holanda in the 1930s to de scribe the Bra zil ian na tional char ac ter. Al ter na tives
to this “cor dial” re li gion do ap pear, how ever, and could be ex plored to de velop
an authentic Wes leyan religio pectorum within and as a contribution to a Bra zil -
ian spir i tu al ity that might be able to over come the ex tremes of ra tio nal ism and
mys ti cism and may lead to the ar tic u la tion of a Chris tian life style that is both
affectionate and engaged.
