680 Umbanda
destroyed spiritual artifacts. In addition, the local
police imprisoned followers of Umbanda for
chanting and drumming in the late evening hours
and labeled the Umbanda religion as “black
magic” and a “hotbed” of communist sympathiz-
ers. The Catholic Church’s attack on the religion
of Umbanda was just as vicious as the Rio de
Janeiro police force’s, if not more so. The Catholic
Church undertook a well-organized campaign to
misrepresent, discredit, and undermine primarily
African Brazilians from their preaching pulpits
and through mass media channels to the point of
excommunicating those who displayed a dual
religious affiliation.
Despite the aggressive police mandates and
intense Catholic religious offensives to eradicate
Umbanda from Rio de Janeiro, this was not
accomplished due to the deep African spiritual
consciousness of thousands of Brazilians, which
could not be unearthed and moved from its center.
In fact, the physical and religious assaults caused
the African-centered form of Umbanda in 1952 to
develop the Spiritist Umbanda Federation, whose
explicit aim was to provide legal registration,
attorney advice, and governmental support to
avoid infringement on religious rights. In addi-
tion, the Spiritist Umbanda Federation sponsored
collective ceremonies, organized spiritual proces-
sions on holidays, and taught doctrine and ritual
practice for Umbanda. In 1956, devotees of
Umbanda established a journal, created the Spirit
College of the Southern Cross to enlighten intel-
lectually, formed coalitions to enhance their
political interests by sponsoring candidates for
positions in the government, and established unity
among the Rio de Janeiro Afro-Brazilians and
Euro-Brazilians. Although informational, scholarly,
and organizational development of Umbanda
constrained some of the racial and class tensions,
there still remains just beneath the surface of
Brazil’s complex human social dynamics and
extremely dysfunctional mind-set a strange state
of spirit that was borne from the hellish enslave-
ment relationship between Portuguese and West
Africans (and indigenous people). The Portuguese
plantation owners projected themselves as supe-
rior humans and the enslaved plantation West
Africans as inferior minds and souls. Currently
in Brazil, the polluted water of supremacy and
inferiority runs under its social soil—and in spiri-
tual spaces. The White Umbanda is considered
superior because it is associated with Kardecism,
and Black Umbanda is deemed inferior because it
is connected with traditional African spiritual rit-
ualism, such as Candomble.
Actually, African Brazilians offered to
Umbanda a spiritual system that has evolved for
thousands of years near and in the ocean water,
on the sandy shores, and on the black-brown soil
of their ancient ancestors. Elements and the
essence of African Brazilians’ spiritual system
that was given to Umbanda are the deepest depth
of spirituality, passionate devotions, Orisha call-
ing songs, spirit calling drums, call-and-response
chants, soul-transcending ceremonies, healing
houses, spiritual spaces, sacred festivals, and
processions to the water. After sunset on
December 31, the devotees of African Umbanda
(and Candomble followers) lead and conduct
their largest spiritually rich African-centered rit-
ual procession and ceremony on the Copacabana
beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Thousands of
devotees, followers, worshippers, and tourists
come to the warm sand, near and in the inviting
ocean water (the water womb, from whence
humans came), to participate in a powerful and
uplifting African-centered spiritualized ritual.
The powerful Mother and Ocean Orisha,
Yemaya, is summoned to protect, bless, and heal
the people in the gathering as the old year ends
and the New Year begins. The African Umbanda
(and Candomble) followers offer to the Orisha
Yemaya their best cooked food, strong spirits,
delicate perfumes, colorful flowers, burning can-
dles, sincere prayers, praise songs, and spirited
polyrhythmic drumming, all as an appeasement
and expression of thankfulness, while they are
dressed in their best white clothing. The massive
ceremony on the warm beach is one of many rit-
uals the devotees of African Umbanda use to
maintain the mystical manifestation of a spiritual
system that enhances their cultural and sacred
bond with their ancestors in the old country,
thousands of miles across the enormous Atlantic
Ocean, where the first traditional African reli-
gions emerged.Ibo Changa