Brazil's Supreme Court Head Allows Video Satirizing Jesus to Be Shown On Netflix

AFP and AP report that the President of Brazil's Supreme Federal Court last Thursday overturned a lower court's preliminary injunction against the Netflix film The First Temptation of Christ. The film depicts Jesus in a gay relationship. In his decision last Thursday,  Judge Antonio Dias Toffoli said in part:

One cannot suppose that a humorous satire has the ability to weaken the values of the Christian faith, whose existence is traced back more than two thousand years, and which is the belief of the majority of Brazilian citizens.

On Christmas Eve, the Brazilian headquarters of Porta dos Fundos -- the company that produced the film-- were pelted with Molotov cocktails.

Brazilian Court Rejects Censorship of Play Depicting Jesus As Trans Woman

In Brazil last week, the São Paulo Court of Justice (the highest state court) lifted an emergency injunction that had been issued by a local court banning further performances of the play "The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven." The art news site Hyperallergic reports on developments.  The play is a one-woman show that depicts Jesus living in the present as a trans woman.  The controversial show was described by the lower court as  "disrespectful to a religion," "aggressive," and of  an "extremely low intellectual level." The appellate court, however, held that the injunction was unconstitutional censorship that effectively forbids artistic activity.

Brazil's Supreme Court Upholds Denominational Religious Classes In Public Schools

Brazil's Constitution, Article 210, provides: "Minimum curricula shall be established for elementary schools.... The teaching of religion is optional and shall be offered during the regular school hours of public elementary schools...." As reported by Folha de S. Paulo and La Croix, on Wednesday, by a 6-5 vote, Brazil's Supreme Court held that this allows teachers in public schools to promote their specific religious beliefs, so long as the classes are optional.  The dissenters argued that religion classes in public elementary schools must be non-confessional, that is, not connected to a specific religion.  The case grew out of a challenge by the Prosecutor General's Office to a 2008 Agreement between Brazil and the Vatican allowing multi-confessional religious instruction in Brazil's public schools.

Brazil's Supreme Federal Court Invalidates Sentences of Abortion Clinic Workers

On Tuesday, a 4-judge panel of the First Chamber of Brazil's Supreme Federal Court overturned the jail sentences of 5 people who were working at an underground abortion clinic near Rio de Janeiro.  Telesur reports:

Judge Luis Roberto Barroso argued in his decision that given that women carry the full burden of reproduction, “there will be full equality only if she is recognized as having the right to decide.”

He argued that women’s health and safety should be ensured without interference, saying, “Having a child determined by the Criminal Code constitutes a serious violation of the physical and psychological integrity of a woman.”

Barroso also noted that criminalization of abortion disproportionately affects poor and marginalized women who face even more restricted access to private services.

Here is the full text in Portuguese of Judge Barroso's opinion. RNS reports that the decision, which is seen as setting precedent "legalizing abortion during the first trimester has caused uproar among politicians with strong ties to Roman Catholic and evangelical faiths, who have gained ground in the current government."

Brazilian Court Awards Damages Against Priest Who Prevented An Abortion

Life Site News reported yesterday that Brazil's appellate court, the Superior Tribunal de Justiça, has ruled in favor of a couple that brought suit against an activist Catholic priest who in 2005 convinced a court to halt an abortion sought by the couple.  The parents had sought a court order to permit the abortion when it became clear that the fetus suffered a severe deformity. Fr. Luiz Carlos Lodi da Cruz, at the time a law student, intervened and successfully sought habeas corpus on behalf of the fetus. Ultimately the child died eight days after birth. The appellate court, in awarding the parents damages equivalent to $18,537 (US), held that the priest had recklessly abused the legal process, causing useless suffering and intense moral damage to the parents.

Olympic Village Now Includes Brazilian-African Religions With Others

Crux reported yesterday that in Olympic Village in Rio de Janeiro, the interfaith center this year includes priests from the Brazilian-African Candomble and Umbanda faiths.  When the International Olympics Committee initially chose only five official religions-- Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism and Hinduism-- to be represented, Brazil's Federal Public Ministry (at the urging of activists) complained arguing that the religious diversity of the host country needed to be represented.  Brazilian law gives Africa-based religions proportional representation in official activities in the country.

Brazilian Court Trains Clergy As Mediators

Religion News Service reports on an experimental mediation program instituted by the courts in the Brazilian state of Goias.  In a program called "Mediar e Divino" ("To Mediate is Divine"), the court is training evangelical pastors, Catholic priests and Protestant ministers to mediate in family law cases and disputes among neighbors. Brazilian courts face massive backlogs of cases.  In Goias state alone, 800,000 new cases were filed last year.

Abortion Restrictions In Latin America Remain Despite Zika Virus Spread

With the Zika virus spreading fast in a number of Latin American countries and the disease's link to microcephaly in newborns, the debate over loosening abortion restrictions is increasing. Reuters reported last week that in Brazil-- which has one of the most restrictive abortion laws-- change is unlikely:

Vandson Holanda, head of health for the Catholic Church in Brazil’s northeast, said there was no chance the Church would shift its position on abortion because of Zika.

Suspected cases of microcephaly have topped more than 4,000 – with more than 400 of those confirmed so far – since Zika was first detected in April....

Women’s rights groups in Brazil ... plan to appeal to the Supreme Court to relax Brazil’s abortion laws. They hope to build on a successful case in 2012 that legalized abortion for anencephaly, where the fetus develops without a major part of its brain and skull.

Given the difficulty of identifying microcephaly before the final weeks of pregnancy, Sinara Gumieri, a legal advisor to Anis, said the group would petition the court to legalize abortion for women diagnosed with Zika whose child was at risk of the condition, even if it is not diagnosed in the fetus. She admitted it would be difficult.

The doctors who led the anencephaly campaign in 2012 do not expect its success to be repeated.

The New York Times last week had more on the Catholic Church's unchanged position.  Meanwhile, the Huffington Post reported that the U.S. Agency for International Development has recommended that the U.S. offer contraceptive and family planning assistance to Latin America.  U.S. law prohibits foreign aid funds being used to pay or advocate for abortion.  At a Feb. 10 House subcommittee hearing on the global Zika epidemic (video of hearing), subcommittee chairman Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-SC) said that the push in Latin American countries for greater access to abortion "is heartbreaking, especially since there are different degrees of microcephaly."

Brazilian Court Affirms Right of Adventist To Close His Service Station For Sabbath

Adventist Review reported yesterday that a court in Brazil has issued an injunction upholding the right of a Seventh Day Adventist to keep his service station closed from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday, despite a rule promulgated by the Brazilian oil industry regulator ANP that gas stations must be open Monday through Saturday for 14 hours per day. João Francisco do Nascimento began his gas station business in the city of Lagarto some six months before ANP adopted the rule he is contesting.