Abstract

DANTAS, Bruna Suruagy do Amaral. Political psychology of religions: an analysis of the symbols and ideologies of the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God. Rev. psicol. polít. [online]. 2013, vol.13, n.28, pp.489-506. ISSN 1519-549X.

As a result of the secularism of the State, the relations between religion and politics have produced reactions of rejection and mistrust, as it is believed that such relations have harmful effects on the consolidation of democracy. However, it has been verified that, despite the development of democratic regimes in Latin America, political spaces have been occupied by distinct religious actors. These actors promote the amalgam between politics and religion, making their limits invisible and their territories flexible. Transcendence has withdrawn from sacrosanct institutions and entered into the secular spheres of politics. In the specific case of Brazil, since the period of the country's re-democratization, the evangelical segments have invested symbolic and material resources in election campaigns with the aim of being included in the legislative and executive powers in the municipal, state and federal levels. The present paper analyzed the ideological dimension of the religious discourse and of the doctrine system of the largest Neo-Pentecostal denomination of Brazil, the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, which uses them to justify its political practices and its avid interest in the political game. Based on the theoretical framework of the Latin American Political Psychology, the symbolic weave composed of the signs of religion and of politics was investigated, in order to verify how religious symbology penetrates the political-electoral universe and what arguments it has to validate the strategies and actions of the UCKG.

Keywords : Political Psychology of Religions; Universal Church of the Kingdom of God; Religion; Politics; Ideology.

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