Brasil: Winter 2004

Cubatão, Sao Paulo state. This city is near Santos, which is east of the city of São Paulo by a few miles and several thousand vertical feet.

This trip is not a normal tourist journey. The church I attend here in Oregon is part of The Evangelical Church of North America. This church also has missionary programs in a number of other countries, including this one small church in Cubatão, Brasil.

This church in Cubatão grew out of a nearby school that was teaching English. Originally, our missionaries in São Paulo were teaching at this English school part time, while they continued their primary work in the city of São Paulo itself. Through people at this school having contact with our missionaries, a number of the students became Christians. However, they did not have a church in that city they felt comfortable attending.

Therefore, approximately two or three years ago, the Evangelical Church of Brasil was incorporated as a Brazilian church, affiliated with the Evangelical Church of North America. The only congregation so far is located in Cubatão.

Toucan rests in a park tree in Cubatão. Wildlife is slowly coming back to the area after years as a textbook example as "the most polluted city on earth." Birth defects and other human casualties are still possible to find, however.

Exactly !!!! It is comforting to know that someone else has noticed the need there.

The Immigrants Highway, as seen from the northwest corner of the city of Cubatão. This modern, US freeway (but not free! - it costs R$13.40 to drive on it during my stay there, or about US$4.62) style road dangles from The Great Escarpment by huge bridges and impressive tunnels.

Please, no, I will not be working as a missionary.

A missionary requires a missionary visa to enter Brasil. A missionary visa requires a theology degree. My university degree is in Engineering.

I can not work while I am in Brazil, because to work in Brazil a work visa requires that I be doing work for a company that has official incorporation in Brasil. This is a church, not a corporation, and therefore I can not do any work. A volunteer work visa requires many months of effort to obtain due to the complexity of the situation that governs those types of visas. Those types can not be approved by Brazilian officials in the USA, requires registration within 90 days with the Brazilian officials, and is really intended for those who are staying in Brazil for a very long period of time. I will be in and out of the country in less than 90 days!

Therefore, I will not be doing work, I will not be a missionary, and I will not be doing volunteer services.

The purpose of this visit is to help strengthen the believers (brothers and sisters in Christ to those of us Christians here in the USA) by visiting them and forming personal relationships with them. If they happen to make some progress in learning English due to their contact with me, that will be an added benefit to their education process that is probably already happening at their English school. Others will probably find themselves stronger in the faith due to my visiting their church, since I will probably develop some relationships with the people inside this church congregation. This is an industrial city, and American visitors to the church there are very rare. However, such personal relationships are just as big an influence, if not more so, than what a regular missionary does when preaching in front of a congregation. The friendships and relationships are where the people get to really see and learn the practical nature of a life in Christ.

I will therefore not be doing any work while I am there in Brasil. It is forbidden by the type of visa I have. Really, this type of relationship building exercise is closer to tourism than any other type of travel. The root motive for the travel is far different than the normal tourism. It is really more of an inter-cultural experience and really doesn't involve working. Certainly, I will not be paid for any of my time there in Brasil.

However, should relationships develop that are beneficial to those in the church that are learning English due to having conversations with me, then there is no law against that happening with a tourist visa.

Um, actually, even though I took Spanish in high school, it is quite horrible. I'm a little better when it comes to Portuguese though.

(Really, how do I answer this question without making this person look like a complete idiot in front of a group of people? Brasil is a former Portuguese colony, and in fact for a period in time Rio de Janeiro was the capital of the Portuguese empire so that the European country was a colony of the country in the New World.)

1. Praparations - that all would be in order. My departure is on the 9th. Ride to airport and all that (I'm still looking for someone to take me).

2. Wisdom - there are so many needs here I'm not sure what to ask for. What to bring. What should stay behind. How to ask questions at the Brazilian consulate without putting everything in danger (I can not say that I am working in the church, because "work" of any sort requires a work visa. I can not say that I am a missionary because that requires a full time resident permit to live in the country as a religious worker. I can not say that I am a short term volunteer because that requires participation in a medical or other service activity.). Wisdom for how to spend the next few days of time.

3. That my focus would remain on what God has me there for, and that I would be aware of what it is that God would have me do.

4. Spiritual awareness - Many times on these types of trips it is possible to miss opportunities just because it wasn't something that was expected.

First, for some time now I have come to ignore the flirting that Brazilian women do. This is simply part of the Brazilian culture and is part of normal male-female relationships. Most of it is quite meaningless.

Second, the Brazilian culture actually has quite a lot of built in safeguards against these types of problems. For example, under many circumstances a man and a woman do not "date" alone by themselves unless they are already pretty much engaged to be married. Otherwise, almost all activities are done as groups of friends. This pretty much eliminates the possibility of there being any wrong done, because it would have had to have happened in public.

I suppose it is a concern that some of the women would look on me, as a single man, as a route to an American citizenship through marriage, and a ticket out of an unpleasant life. However, this not the type of relationship that will likely happen in only a few weeks.

Remember also that we are dealing with divine intervention, and I don't intend to let whatever others are doing interfere with what God has in mind. In the days leading up to the trip, God has already proven adequate for the task of keeping my mind focused on the task at hand.