Latin American Evangelicals Offer Safety to Jewish Diaspora — There's a Catch

The Evangelical Christian movement, which groups together charismatic, pentecostal, and other protestant Christian faiths, is the fastest-growing religious movement in Latin America. It now boasts over 160 million members and will have a majority share in most countries in the region in the next decade. Ten years ago, it boasted a meager 19 percent. Presidents and high-ranking politicians in the region are practicing Evangelicals, including former presidents of Brazil and Guatemala. 

The Latin American Evangelical faith places Israel, and Judaism, at the center of its spiritual cause. But what does its rise mean for Israel and the region’s more than 500,000 Jews? Well, it’s complicated.

The region is witnessing a furor of anti-semitic and anti-Israel sentiment, as hate crimes against Jews are up by hundreds of percentage points; millions of people march in support of Islamist terrorists; and regional leaders cut ties with Israel and call Jews “Nazis.”

One of the bulwarks against such a rise in anti-Jewish hatred has been the Evangelical movement. 

While the traditionally Catholic left has courted extremists, the Evangelical right has held mass marches in solidarity with Israel, and its most powerful religious and political representatives have traveled to Israel to rally support. Among Latin American Evangelicals, support for Israel, including its just war against the Islamist forces in the Middle East, is overwhelming. 

Even in the United States, where hundreds of thousands of exiled Latino Jews live, the Latino Evangelical movement has expressed solidarity with Israel. Rev. Samuel Rodríguez Jr., the President of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, issued strong support for Israel and recounts the Zionist national flag being flown frequently at evangelical services, Hebrew songs being sung, and sermons given about the war in Gaza. In a recent interview, he said, “There is a super commitment on behalf of Latino evangelicals with Israel, especially the Pentecostal ones. It’s one of the most unreported stories.” 

While they should continue to foment their relationship with the Evangelical movement in the region, Jews and Zionists alike must recognize the temporality and pragmatism of this alliance. Most Latino Evangelical leaders and followers themselves view the Jews and Israel as a means to an end — to bring about the second coming of Christ and, ultimately, Armageddon and the Rapture, which would see all Jews go to hell and Christians resurrected, and Israel destroyed. Though Evangelicals offer a safe harbor for Israel now, the tenets of their faith allow leeway for antisemitism to rise within the movement.

Antisemitic sentiment, while less commonplace among the Evangelical movement than in the Catholic Church, remains a problem. The Catholic Church, a founding (and ever-powerful) institution of all Latin American states, created a subcontinent porous with antisemitic conspiracy theories, a basis for a significant number of colonial and modern wars in the region. 

For instance, La Violencia, the beginning of nearly a century of ideological violence in Colombia, was partly started due to a widespread conspiracy of powerful Jews plotting against the ruling republican class. 

As millions of Latino Evangelicals are former Catholics, these theories have still permeated the regional spiritual fabric. We also cannot forget that the socialist dictatorships in Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela have used liberation theology to strengthen an Evangelical left movement that is antisemitic and anti-Israel.

Having attended dozens of church services across the subcontinent, I have found conservative Evangelical services to repeat antisemitic lies, which in turn motivate the base towards a central mission of converting Jews towards their ultimate goal in the End Times, attempting to make Jews stray away from their faith and their people. Pastors repeatedly tell attendees that they must seek out the “Hebrews” as converts, who “rejected the Messiah and must repent.” They give instructions to “invite them into your homes” and “show them the kindness of the Lord,” and only invite them to church after some time.

Spiritual leaders in the Church continue to sermonize the libel that these “Hebrews” killed Jesus, and will be killed in a fiery death unless they accept the Lord as their savior, whether through conversion or in the afterlife. The Church organizes frequent trips to Israel for this very purpose and sends thousands of paraders down to the yearly Festival of Tabernacles (or Sukkot) in Jerusalem. These gestures make clear that Jews have no place in Evangelicals’ spiritual pursuits.

Evangelicals in Latin America adopt significant Jewish and Hebrew symbology, from building a life-sized replica of the Temple of Solomon in São Paulo to teaching free Biblical Hebrew classes and using Hebrew terms in services. Evangelical leaders, in a gesture of solidarity, have even funded Jewish community centers and funded and attended synagogues — including the Evangelical former President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro. 

Thousands of new Messianic Christians (and Messianic Jews) in Latin America also read the Torah, observe Jewish holidays, and learn Hebrew — though they still embrace Christian theology including Jesus Christ. While this helps strengthen support for Israel and Jewish values and theology, Jews and Zionists must not think there are no strings attached. 

The region also remains in constant political instability — and the places and people we might consider safe today may be inhabitable tomorrow. The thousands of Sephardic Jews who, after finding refuge from the brutalities of the Old World, left Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela know this better than anyone. Jews and Zionists must remain adaptable, and continue striving to form shtetl ach in their adopted homes, but they must always remember that this is a temporary comfort from a permanent goal — return. 

For now, the growing Evangelical movement serves as the sole source of rhetorical, policy, and financial support (and perhaps refuge) for Zionism and Judaism in the region. The Evangelical movement, particularly through its support for Israel and its Hebraization, also represents an opportunity for Judaism and diaspora Zionism to continue growing.

Jews and Zionists should accept it, and leverage its growing influence to push for its values and objectives. However, the community must remain vigilant, and keep in mind the nuanced flaws that populate the regional Evangelical movement.