Religião, direito e comunicação: a comoção religiosa no caso João de Deus

Abstract

This work deals with a study of the relationship between religion, communication, and law, based on a case of a religious scandal motivated by a series of violent crimes against women committed by the medium João Teixeira de Faria, internationally known as "João de Deus". In this sense, the objective is to understand how the meanings and scope of communication, in its private and public modes, interfered with the protection of the criminal, from the several years in which he victimized women who sought him out for spiritual treatment, to the realization of the scandal that ended his trajectory and turned him into a convicted criminal by the Brazilian justice system. To this end, this dissertation proposes the concept of "religious commotion", as a category capable of encompassing the different phases of the incident, discusses the issue of sexism and violence against women in a religious context, analyzes the trajectory of religious commotion in the João de Deus case, based on various reports made by the victims and recorded in two documentaries about the scandal. Finally, theoretical and conceptual conclusions were sought through a triangular and tensional theorization between Law, Religion, and Communication, defending the thesis that the meanings of communication alter identity formations, taboos, and the perception of law in religious environments where crimes are committed