The month of June in Northeastern Brazil commemorates three saints, Saint Anthony, Saint John, and Saint Peter with parties and celebrations. Because the festas celebrate Catholic saints, we see that Catholicism is it is not only a religion people practice, but ingrained in Brazilian culture. Igreja Batista do Pinheiro is of course a Baptist church, but last month, they sponsored to at least four forro parties, a traditional dance and music to celebrate Saint John. At these parties, people dress up in colorful dresses and shirts and straw hats, and join together with a live band and dance the night away. The movement reminded me of a two-step, but you have to put your hips into it to get the full effect. Forro music is very lively, with drums, a guitar, and a accordion. The music originated in Northeast Brazil, some believe that it began when the US military was based in Brazil, and they had a celebration that was “for all”.  We spent the month mastering our forro skills at all the festas and learning how to celebrate with the Brazilians.

After a full month of forro, we were eager to learn more about Brazilian music. So the girls we are living with took us to a bar and we heard pagode. Pagode is also lively with a lot more drums and a lot less accordion. We also went to a concert on the beach where a group were dancing ritmo, a dance involving fast footwork. In fact, to go to the concert at the beach, we skipped evening worship service to attend, to which our supervisor said, “No problem!” Hey, we were learning Brazilian culture.

It is rare in the United States to find a church that would sponsor a celebration as such; at church when we threw parties there was just some nice piano in the background and people standing around eating cookies and punch. No one danced. I grew up AME, and during our annual conference some of the adults wanted to have a party for the youth, which they did, but some others disagreed with a church sponsored party. To appease their guilt, they simple held the party off the church grounds. In contrast, the forro parties in Maceió were held right on the church grounds. From this, I learn that Brazilians have a different understanding of celebration. There is no guilt in wanting to celebrate together with dance or music other than Christian; you simply celebrate because you enjoying being together and sharing in the joy that God has given us.

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