In a one-kilometer march, the women walked along Ho-chi-min avenue towards Praça da Independência, to the Maculusso cathedral, in Luanda, displaying posters that read "No to the violation of the Constitution of the Republic of Angola, no foreign exchange evasion, not vasectomy, is a right to start a family ".
With the pamphlets, the protesters reminded the "lord bishops and pastors" that "the altar is a holy place", asking them not to "lie" in the pulpit. The group was forced, by the police, to stop a hundred meters away from the Maculusso cathedral.
On the spot, women shouted slogans, read a motion of solidarity with the wives and pastors of the IURD, in which they appealed to all women's organizations in Angola, deputies and national and international organizations that defend human rights, in particular that of women. women, so as not to be oblivious to the cause.
"We urge the institutions of law, the international community, especially our President João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço, to do justice", the motion said.
The women also said that "it is well known that constant violations of human rights, of the international conventions to which Angola is a signatory, occur within the wives of pastors of the IURD".
"That is why we express all our solidarity and shout that we do not accept the mutilation of the male genitals, not the imposed vasectomy and not the extermination of the human race", urged the protesters.
Speaking to the Lusa agency, Nádia Monteiro, a member of the church, said that the promoters of the march took advantage of the fact that March is the month of women to raise awareness of this problem in society.
Nádia Monteiro recalled that there is already a criminal complaint about the acts they denounced, stressing that "women within the church have suffered a lot of mistreatment, are oppressed, many of them because of the oppression even have an abortion, and it is mandatory vasectomy "for pastors.
"In the church it is mandatory for men, thus canceling the woman's dream of being a mother," he said.
The surgical procedure "is not a problem, because it is a contraceptive method, but the couple, the person concerned, have to do it freely and spontaneously". But, "the church does not accept, the church requires it to be done".
According to Nádia Monteiro, because a group of pastors and members of the church were opposed to these practices, they are suffering reprisals, including evictions from housing, withdrawal of living expenses, among others.
"The church evicted several pastors from the house, the pastors are homeless, the children have stopped studying, because the church has stopped supporting", he stressed, lamenting that the Brazilian leadership since the beginning of this dispute has never come out to challenge the accusations, limiting to issue announcements.
In turn, Odete Carla considered that "it is not fair what the Brazilians are doing to the Angolan".
According to Odete Carla, from the cathedral of Morro Bento, the number of pastors who have undergone vasectomy is high, in the order of three hundred.
Despite this, Odete Carla promises to continue to be faithful in the church, demanding only that there be reforms in that evangelical confession.
"What is happening in the country is not fair, we do not accept that, we want the Brazilian leadership abroad, we want the Angolan leadership, because at IURD it is a business that exists, envelope after envelope. No more starting to explore the Angolan people. , enough of a lot of catastrophe inside the church ", he affirmed.
Jorge Francisco, who has been a member of the IURD since it was legalized in Angola, said that there are proven reports that pastoral women are prevented from having a healthy pregnancy and, in some cases, the pregnancy has been interrupted by psychological pressure.
Asked to comment on the reason that leads pastors to accept undergoing a vasectomy procedure, Jorge Francisco explained that there is a doctrine and a whole preparation before becoming a pastor, which leads to this situation.
"Before becoming a pastor, he begins to be a candidate for a worker, then he becomes a worker and when he becomes a pastor, he does not yet undergo a vasectomy, only when he becomes a consecrated pastor, in which pressure and responsibility are greater, and all that journey has already been made, especially psychological work, obviously there is almost an imposition there, a moral obligation for him to accept the vasectomy ", he indicated.
Jorge Francisco said that the objective is not to create a new universal, but "to ban all harmful practices that have taken place in the IURD in Angola".
"From the first moment the objective was to stop and reform the church without creating a renewed universal, to reform harmful practices in the church, especially vasectomy, foreign exchange evasion, which is the most serious case, and also another serious case that is the sale of the church's patrimony ", he said.
The divergences come since November of last year, when a group of bishops and pastors of the IURD announced the total break with the Brazilian leadership, guided by Edir Macedo.
In a statement, signed by more than 300 Angolan bishops and pastors, the mandatory practices of male sterilization, evasion of foreign currency abroad and sale of the church's assets were denounced.
In light of the complaints, the Attorney General's Office opened a criminal case which is still under investigation.
In Brazil, there are 150 actions against the practice of vasectomy by the IURD. The institution has always refused to impose this practice on its pastors.
