Umbanda

Umbanda (Portuguese pronunciation: [ũˈbɐ̃dɐ]) is a religion that emerged in Brazil during the 1920s. It draws elements from Spiritism, Afro-Brazilian traditions like Candomblé, and Roman Catholicism. There is no central authority in control of Umbanda, which is organized around autonomous places of worship termed centros or terreiros, the followers of which are called Umbandistas. Adherents of this monotheistic religion believe in a single God who is distant from humanity. Beneath this entity are powerful non-human spirits called orixás. In the more Spiritist-oriented wing of the religion, White Umbanda, these are viewed as divine energies or forces of nature; in more Africanised forms they are seen as West African deities and are offered animal sacrifices. The emissaries of the orixás are the pretos velhos and caboclos, spirits of enslaved Africans and of indigenous Brazilians respectively, and these are the main entities dealt with by Umbandistas. At Umbandist rituals, spirit mediums sing and dance in the hope of channeling these spirits, through whom the congregations receive guidance, advice, and healing. Umbanda teaches a complex cosmology involving a system of reincarnation according to the law of karma. The religion's ethics emphasise charity and social fraternity. Umbandistas also seek to reverse harm that they attribute to practitioners of a related tradition, Quimbanda. Roman Catholicism was the dominant religion in early 20th-century Brazil, but sizeable minorities practiced Afro-Brazilian traditions or Spiritism, a French version of Spiritualism developed by Allan Kardec. Around the 1920s, various groups may have been combining Spiritist and Afro-Brazilian practices, forming the basis of Umbanda. The most important group was that established by Zélio Fernandino de Moraes and those around him in Niterói, Rio de Janeiro. He had been involved in Spiritism but disapproved of the negative attitude that many Spiritists held towards contact with pretos velhos and caboclos. Reflecting Umbanda's growth,...