RIO DE JANEIRO – Like every Sunday, Brazilian Pastor Silas Malafaia took the stage of his Pentecostal temple in a middle-class Rio de Janeiro neighborhood.
But this week, he wore a T-shirt instead of a blazer and, behind the three cameras broadcasting to his legion of YouTube followers, were thousands of empty seats.
Brazil's churches have landed on the front lines of a battle between state governors, who have introduced quarantine measures designed to contain spread of the new coronavirus, and President Jair Bolsonaro, who is actively undermining them and says a broad lockdown will ultimately destroy Brazil’s economy.