Assembleias de Deus

The Assembléias de Deus are a group of Pentecostal denominations in Brazil related to the Assemblies of God. Altogether, the churches that bear the name Assembleias de Deus in Brazil had 8.5 million adherents in 2001.

Background

The Assembléias de Deus began when Daniel Berg and Gunnar Vingren, two Swedish Baptist immigrants from South Bend, Indiana had the Pentecostal experience in Chicago and departed to Brazil. They came to Belém, Pará, Brazil, where in 1911 founded the Missão de Fé Apostólica, which later changed its name in 1918 to "Assembléia de Deus".

The Pentecostal movement in Brazil had already been started by that time among Italians in São Paulo, by an Italian-American missionary, Louis Francescon, who initiated the Christian Congregation of Brazil (CCB) in 1910. While the CCB spread in the South, the Assembleias de Deus reached the Amazon villages and the semi-arid Nordeste before migrants from the North brought the Church to Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo in the late 1920s.

The Assembleia de Deus was intimately linked to the Scandinavian Pentecostal movement, led by Lewi Pethrus, who financed and sent missionaries to help Berg and Vingren. The Swedish Pentecostals give autonomy to the Brazilian Assembleia de Deus in a General Convention in 1932.

The Brazilian Assembleia de Deus has always send missionaries abroad, starting in 1913 when a returning Portuguese immigrant was commanded to Portugal.

Schism

Since 1980s the Assembleias de Deus suffered several schisms and splits and many Conventions and "Ministérios" left using the same name. The most significant are:
* General Convention of the Assemblies of God of Brazil (CGADB) - the biggest and most traditional convention, the only group that has official fellowship with the American Assemblies of God, headquartered in Rio de Janeiro and considers itself the heir of the Swedish mission. The CGADB had nearly 3,5 million members in 2001.
* National Convention of the Assemblies of God- Also known as the Assembleias de Deus Ministerio Madureira - started as an internal "ministerio" of the CGADB in 1958, with headquarters in the Madureira neighborhood in Rio de Janeiro, but in 1989 was expeled from the General Convention, taking 1/3 of its membership and churches. It has an episcopal governance, but doctrinally is similar to the GCADB. It had about 2 million members in 2001.
* Assembleia de Deus Betesta - headquartered in Fortaleza, Ceará. It has nearly 200 churches, serving mostly middle class.
* There are almost a hundred small "minsterios" and independent conventions.

External links

* [http://www.cgadb.com.br/ CGADB - Convenção Geral das Assembléias de Deus no Brasil] in Portuguese
* [http://www.iadcg.org/ ADM - Assembléia de Deus - Missões - em Campo Grande, MS, Brasil] in Portuguese