"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.� Already in 1941, the Church had a membership of 14,000, which leverage its pastor, the Rev. Adam Clayton Powell Jr., to take a seat at the New York City Council. In 1944, Powell was elected to the United States Congress, representing the 22nd. District. The Abyssinian Reverend was able to combine the Christian message of Justice and Equality with the militant oratory of a political leader, essential to those years of doctrines of Nazism and Fascism. Powell served as Chair of the Education and Labor Committee, supported the claims of African Americans, directly and indirectly altering about 60 public laws to benefit blacks, the elderly, the disabled, Hispanic Americans, women and poor whites. Adam Powell Jr. led the Congregation by making it socially and politically active as a vital part of the success of the "Black Revolution," and in the 1950s and 1960s, the Abyssinian Baptist Church engaged in boycotts and pickets to eliminate racial discrimination. Currently under the command of Rev. Dr. Calvin O. Butts III, the Abyssinian has contributed to the development of the Harlem community by broadening the cultural awareness of belonging from actions and its positive messages within its ecumenical domain. Dr. Butts insisted against negative lyrics and images in the entertainment industry, drawing attention to the repercussions of such messages, from apology to violence and sexism, on the training of African American youth. Investment in youth education resulted in the Marshall Thurgood Academy for Learning and Social Change in 1993, this being the first new school built in New York in more than 50 years. On the occasion of the bicentenary of the Abyssinian Church, they made a pilgrimage to Ethiopia and since then have worked together with Ethiopian farmers in cooperation for the production of coffee and its distribution in the North American market. We were at the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem last September. It was a pleasant experience, we attended the service given by Reverend Butts, we heard the Choir, and I was particularly reflective of the minister's lecture that limited - emphatically though - to Chapter 1 of the Genesis Book: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth ". From then on the Reverend went on to criticize the neo-Pentecostal religions that spread throughout the world, particularly known to us Brazilians, and that Jesus, "the son of God made man", has more power than the Father Himself. Observing the Laws of God
, I attribute the fact of preferentially using the name of Jesus and not that of God, because the Neo-Pentecostals fear the consequences of not obeying the Third Commandment: "You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.(Exodus 20:7) In the course of the ceremony Rev. Butts said nothing about the racism represented by this blind faith in the words of a bishop like the Macedo of the Universal Church. But the faithful, if they were not all rich, dressed in such a way that they seemed ready to be. The Abyssinian Baptist Church Choir has gained international fame for its performances of classic sacred songs; While religious faith was decreasing contrary to the material development of societies, the Abyssinian established itself as one of the greatest temples of Protestant faith. Certainly the aggregating and comforting effect of the Church and its Choir generated in the Catholic churches such investments as the Missa Luba of the 1950s, which added to the sacred Latin songs, traditional songs of Congo, sung by a chorus of children and adolescents in Their African language. Also happened in Brazil, the Mass of the Quilombos, celebrated only once in Recife, in 1981, with songs of Milton Nascimento. Both Catholic experiences of "good will" toward the Africans and their descendants did not advance from the stage to the daily liturgy. The particular form that Africans in the Diaspora exercise their religiosity, such as CandomblĂŠ in Bahia and Umbanda in Rio de Janeiro, in recent years, have resulted in what is called "religious intolerance" with drastic consequences for those who have faith in the OrixĂĄs. Faith that inherited from the times of slavery, sought freedom and peace of mind, currently represents a resistance to acculturation, a front to combat racism that punctuates Brazilian social relations. Ultimately, abandoning the justification of syncretism for the "people of the saint," and the growing appreciation of its ancestral African identity, is the irrefutable proof of the insubordination to the canons of the Eurocentric religion as absolute truth for the metaphysical explanation of human existence. Yes, Africans in Africa and Diaspora have for some time been humanly conscious, something that is ignored by Brazilian neo-Pentecostal proselytes, who use a dehumanizing discourse of Africans in order to demonize religions with African roots.