1Pentecostalism has existed as a social force and political actor in Luanda for over two decades. However, the way in which it intersects with state policies, different levels of state management, and contemporary urban life is still understudied. As Luanda is saturated with Pentecostal groups and churches (particularly the non-central neighbourhoods), in this article I suggest including Pentecostalism in the heuristic triangle of Pentecostalism-Urbanity-State governance to explore new analytical dimensions of social and urban embodiments and disruptions of top-down political projects in Angola. I propose that Pentecostalism in Luanda should be approached as an urban formation, the practices and religious imaginaries of which are shaped by urban imaginaire and urban dwelling practices. Looking closely at the intersections of Pentecostalism, governing policies and urban practices will provide an insight into how specific social formations in Angola, such as Pentecostal groups, approach, deal with, and employ state ideologies of governance and development at the level of institutional and everyday practice. The article will analyse the Pentecostal enactment of the new citizenship model as it is promoted by the state. It will also study how state governance ideologies are instrumentalized by Pentecostal churches to maintain the equilibrium of the socio-religious space, potentially keeping the state away.
2In this article, I will focus on how Pentecostalism intersects with ‘New Luanda’, a powerful social imaginary, being both a nonconformist practice and a particular path to ‘New Luanda’. In parallel with ‘New Angola’ – the post-war reconstruction scheme introduced by the Angolan state (Pearce 2015, Schubert 2015, 2017) – ‘New Luanda’ might be understood as an aspirational project, a set of desired ways of urban life triggered by the ‘New Angola’ development discourse and its continuation, ‘Angola 2050’, that persist in Angola’s public sphere. ‘New Luanda’ should also be seen as a social imaginary that shapes urban developmental projects and horizons on the journey to the hoped-for future. Inasmuch as it mirrors the state-promoted model of idealized citizenship, ‘New Luanda’ involves inclusions and exclusions from this type of citizenship project. Marking urban belonging and managing inhabitants’ self-location in the imagined socio-geography, ‘New Luanda’ steers how people navigate Luanda. However, ‘New Luanda’ equally reveals disruptions and failures in its own fantasies.
3Given the place taken by Pentecostalism in the religious and political landscape of Angola, particularly its urban expression, I suggest examining the public space of Pentecostalism through Luanda’s urbanity. To properly locate Pentecostalism in the urbanity framework and highlight the links between urbanity and state governance, I will follow recent urban studies scholarship (Pieterse 2011a, 2011b, Amin & Cirolia 2018, Cirolia & Scheba 2019, Gastrow 2020b), understanding urbanity both as a politico-economic project on a macro scale and as a lived experience. Both are linked to sets of specific urban imaginaries, which manage particular urban practices, aspirations, and developmental schemes. I assume that the relation between these dimensions will neither be dualistic nor mutually exclusive, but instead an assemblage and ongoing process of negotiation (Mbembe & Roitman 1995, Gastrow 2017b). I will rely on such understandings of complex and mutual formations of urban and social and religious constructs when approaching the Luanda-based Pentecostal churches. I follow Jörg Rüpke (2020) who understands urbanities and religion as reciprocal formations. This allows Pentecostal imagination and performances to be approached as an intrinsic part of urban genealogy. Conversely, urbanity might be seen as a crucial part of Pentecostal formation, even though some of the emic Pentecostal narratives tend to see cities as external and frequently as a malicious threat. Such an approach reveals how various social formations, including Pentecostal groups, deal with fitting in or diverting the state policies as a bottom-up practice and how state-promoted ideologies such as ‘New Luanda’ and ‘New Angola’ are co-produced and distorted on the ground of urban practice. This opens the way to further reflection on the various forms of compliance or disruption and rebellion against dominating and imposed governing structures in Angola. I argue that Pentecostalism should be understood as one of such resistance and support forms.
4This article stems from fieldwork spanning several years over the past decade, focusing on two Angolan churches: the Assemblies of God of Maculusso (AGM) and the Bom Deus (BD) church (Igreja Fraternidade Evangélica de Pentecostes na África em Angola – Bom Deus, IFEPÁA). The ethnographic research was conducted in Luanda from 2013 to 2014 and in 2023. The ethnography of both churches was complemented through research in Lisbon (2013-2019), London (2016-2017), on several Cape-Verdian islands (2018, 2022) and in São Paulo, Brazil (2022), adding further dimensions to the data collected in Luanda. In Luanda, a substantial part of the ethnographic data is linked to urban ethnography and walking as a method of ethnographic research (Ingold & Vergunst 2008). Walking and commuting daily, I followed my interlocutors and church members through very different spatialities in Luanda, trying to make sense of their practices within urban dwellings as religious subjects and the manner in which they experienced and understood the city. Another part of the research is ethnography conducted directly in Pentecostal churches. My positionality as a non-Pentecostal, non-native speaker of Portuguese, and Eastern European scholar made me constantly (re)consider the various levels of Othering I was instigating in the field and in the communities I studied. Ultimately, Luanda itself became for me a platform for building relationships based on the shared experience of dwelling in the city and forms of conviviality merged in Luanda’s “Pentecost” (Eriksen et al. 2019).
5Since the end of the civil war, Luanda has been embedded in the political project of Angola’s post-war reconstruction and development (Gastrow 2017a, 2017b, Schubert 2017, Cardoso et al. 2023). In 2002, the Luena peace treaties were signed, ending almost three decades of civil war. Framed by Schubert (2015) as “Year Zero”, 2002 launched a new era of social and economic life for Angola, supported by a new ideology sponsored by the victorious MPLA party. In this ‘New Angola’ political project, development became one of the keywords and the master narrative of reconstruction (Schubert 2015). With oil-backed loans, the reconstruction plan started in 2003, positioning the post-war reconstruction as an African optimist narrative (Tomás 2012, Oliveira 2015, Gastrow 2017a, 2017b). There were several focal points targeted by the MPLA. Housing, roads, railroads, airports, and power plants constituted the core large-scale infrastructure to be reconstructed or built from scratch with the substantial engagement of Brazil and China, introducing a new dimension to the model adopted to implement the development goals. Additionally, social development projects, which were also launched during the wave of post-war reconstruction, have been to a large extent shaped – often beyond local specificity – according to the frameworks of transnational and global aid agencies and NGOs, introducing a globalized, Western-centred matrix and operational schemes for local needs. These also include interpolations from civil society movements like women’s empowerment and LGBTQ+ organizations. Most recent development plans such as ‘Angola 2050’ following the early years of reconstruction scheme projects feed largely on global diagnostics of developmental needs and frame them as leading governance products. This is the case, for instance, for green energy projects (Blanes 2023).
6In the ‘New Angola’ developmental scheme, Luanda became a crucial spot framed discursively as ‘New Luanda’ and gathered various infrastructure investments. ‘New Luanda’ became an assemblage of state-development management visions, popular discourses that arose as a consequence of omnipresent state advertising and development projects, and a particular vertical, hypermodern (Gastrow 2020a) aesthetic. At the material and spatial level, ‘New Luanda’ found its embodiment in the politics of concrete (Croese 2013, 2018, Schubert 2017, Gastrow 2017a, 2017b, Buire 2017). This material aspect of ‘New Luanda’ also produces and manages socio-spatial exclusion. The old colonial city centre (Cidade Baixa) became an open-air construction site, where high-rise glass and concrete buildings, available for international companies and the wealthy, started to emerge. The remodelling of historic sites with iconoclastic projects, such as the new waterfront and its US-imported palm trees, was supposed to transform the image of Luanda into an African Dubai (Croese 2021). Several neighbourhoods were cleansed of long-standing inhabitants to provide space for modern housing projects and new spatial arrangements, as in the case of Chicala (Moreira 2018). Housing development politics, centralidades, focused on spaces providing huge residential projects of several-storey buildings. The most famous case was Kilamba, which was actually inconsistent with the Angolan way of life: too small for large families and without access to a quintal (a communal zone), yet seen as the fulfilment of fantasies of modern dignified housing for the average Angolan middle-class family (Buire 2017, Croese & Pitcher 2018). Even though the most desired area of ‘New Luanda’ is located in the Luanda Sul district, in the Talatona neighbourhood, with gated communities for wealthy Angolans and expats (Gastrow 2019), there are several spots associated with ‘New Luanda’ that persist in the imagination of city dwellers as navigation landmarks, legitimizing activities and time spent in, or linked to, these spaces. These include old Portuguese quarters such as Maculusso, Alvalade, Vila Alice, Mutamba, and Maianga, where the historical elite of Luanda continues to hold on to the real estate.
7However, as several scholars argue (Oliveira 2007, 2015, Schubert 2015, 2017), the infrastructure-based development model cannot be considered without a backstage political project. The idea of ‘New Angola’ implies specific historical politics, especially in terms of the memories of the Angolan conflict (Pearce 2015, 2017). As Schubert (2015, see also Pearce 2005) explains, the new post-war peace period is discursively presented in opposition to wartime confusão (confusion). Thus, all sociopolitical issues that might disturb the stability of peace (such as the debate on reconciliation), difficult memories, nonconformist social movements, independent and legally unrecognized religious organizations, and allusions to local racial, gender, class, or ethnic particularities have been silenced or ignored, as they might be considered to be war-related problems acting against the new stability. Rafael Marques called it “escola do medo” – a culture of fear and a reluctance to express criticism against the ruling powers, which became a backdrop to the citizenship model promoted by the MPLA during the post-war years and has only recently eased. According to Martins (2016), the rules allowing citizenship rights to be exercised are fluid in Angola, as they are politicized and depend on current political governance. However, the ‘New Angola’ project entails a ‘New Man’ (Homem Novo) – a new subjectivity for the Angolan citizen. The ‘New Man’, an idealized model of the Angolan citizen, is presumed to comply with political state ideology and political management, but the concept assumes a certain social location with respect to class and ethnicity, for instance. As such, the ‘New Man’ reverberates with the socialist discourse coined after the decolonization of Angola, which linked the Marxist project of the ‘New Man’ with Angolanidade (“Angolanness”), blending Angolan cultural exceptionalism with the socialist political project and sociopolitical agenda of the Eastern bloc (Collier 2013). However, the recently revamped concept of the ‘New Man’ is a rather far echo of the Marxist project as, apart from the aforementioned understanding of class and ethnic location, it focuses on the subjectivities shaped by the capitalist and neoliberal modus operandi, leaving a limited and heavily controlled space for local cultural expression.
8The MPLA reconstruction scheme has sought to impose a master narrative based on a vision of Angolan unity, promulgated despite geographical divisions, dramatic social stratification, and ethnic diversity. As a result, ethnicity and class, which are perceptibly embedded in the socio-spatial division of Luanda, are major sites of exclusion from the ‘New Luanda’ citizenship and development project. An exemplary case considers the continuing public attitudes towards the Bakongo ethnicity, labelled frequently as Congolese, zairenses, or langas and stereotyped negatively as backward, sowers of confusão (confusion), or non-Angolans (Pereira 2008, Pearce 2017). Several neighbourhoods in Luanda, such as Palanca, Hoji Ya Henda or Mabor, are considered by Luanda’s inhabitants to be “Bakongo neighbourhoods” and, according to some of my interlocutors, “the most chaotic spaces of Luanda”. Many of my interlocutors, who live outside Bakongo bairros (neighbourhoods), depicted these areas as disorganized and shameful for Luanda; they were considered to be “Congo in Luanda”, no-go zones, meaning primarily “there is no need and interest to go there”. Recent mockery in the form of a Tik Tok film on the use of escalators in the Hoji Ya Henda shopping centre is an example of continuous stigmatization.1 In many narratives I collected on positioning Luanda in relation to Congo or Kinshasa, Luanda fared badly, but there was always something worse in Kinshasa or Congo in general. In such a framework, spatialities linked with Bakongo people or culture are excluded from the ‘New Luanda’ policy of belonging.
9Luanda’s socio-spatiality is also heavily tied to social and class stratification. As mentioned before, several urban areas in Luanda, such as Kilamba, Talatona, Luanda’s waterfront, Cidade Baixa, and Ilha de Luanda, are emblematic representations of the ideology and policy of state reconstruction. They were rethought, refurbished, or built as luxury, modern spaces. Yet relatively few Angolans are explicitly included in these social spaces, which are thought of as capital-based or middle-class and seen as markers for the ‘New Angola’ and ‘New Man’ subjectivities. As Schubert shows, Angola’s middle-class, as imagined in the ‘New Angola’ political ideology, is a construct that holds for only a few people and is hardly, if at all, defined through purchasing power or legitimized by historical heritage, as it is for the elite of Luanda’s city centre. As a result, many people, who are not linked with these spaces, feel excluded from citizenship in ‘New Angola’ and follow different upgrading models or rework this notion to fit them (Schubert 2015, 2016) as, for instance, in the case of many Pentecostal churches, which will be explored in the following sections.
10Jess Auerbach observed how many people in Angola who do not fit the social perception of the middle-class are guided by the ideals linked to a specific “middle-class sensorium”, seeing them as the goal during the process or hunt for social upgrading (Auerbach 2020). While she states that the principal middle-class aspirations are related to a home, education, and a car, she also explores markers of aspirations to the imaginary that is ‘New Angola’. She shows how tuning the senses for various practices, materialities, and perceptions plays a role in setting limits for the middle-class identity and explores how particular notions linked with senses (such as specific foods, clothes, or perfumes) refine the notion of what it is to be middle-class. Auerbach observes how many people who do not form part of the middle-class are guided by these ideals, seeing them as the finishing line in the race of social upgrading (Auerbach 2020). This links to Schubert’s comments on the Angolan “culture of immediatism” and compliance with the imposed political style and the narratives implemented by common Luandans. Schubert claims that, instead of opposing the narratives of progress and visions for the future that exclude most of Luanda’s inhabitants, people are often compliant with the state’s political visions and imaginaries of development, applying them if they find a way to tap into the flow of capital or opportunities (Schubert 2018a). All these explanations indicate a common longing for inclusion in the state model of citizenship, with a concomitant granting of access to the outcomes of reconstruction policy achievements.
11‘New Luanda’ became a common, powerful social imaginary enacted in everyday urban practices, expressed and criticized in a more subtle way through artistic expressions and social actions. For example, the song “Berço de lata” by local rap group Fat Soldiers2 describes “ghettos” – the term used by many people to refer to several neighbourhoods – as tin cradles where “the condemned depend only on their fortune”. The song narrates the hardships of life in the bairros, dealing with the shortage of services, schooling and health system failures, unemployment, housing problems, infrastructure issues, and high rates of crime. The artists repeat in one of the verses that “there is no order and no progress” (não há ordem nem progresso), refuting the dominant MPLA narrative of success by inverting the Brasilian national slogan of “order and progress”. This contradiction is also seen in the work of Angolan artists Kiluanje Kia Henda, João Ana, and Orlando Sérgio, Utopia em terra queimada (Utopia in the Burned Land, 2017), exhibited in room 112 during the “Fuckin’ Globo” cyclic, non-institutional, independent art event in Luanda. The installation performance reveals a dark land, alluding to fossil resources such as coal or, in the case of Angola, oil. It resembles the remains after a conflagration, the outcome of a catastrophe. In the middle sits a man wearing a suit, reading a journal, with the headlines “Luxo, Lexus, Lixo” (Luxury, Lexus, Rubbish) or “Novo rico” and “Pobre eterno” (New Rich, Eternal Poor),3 narrating Luanda’s fracture in the broader context of oil-fuelled “savage capitalism” (capitalismo selvagem), as many inhabitants of Angola see the new economic and political reality of the country (Auerbach 2020).
- 4 Dércio Tsandzana 2018, “‘You Just Killed Me’: The Internet Meme Defying Angola’s Government”, Globa (...)
12A number of social actions (see also the ‘selfie lixo’ campaign) serve as examples of criticism of the reality of life in Luanda, underpinning the state-promoted success narrative of ‘New Luanda’. In 2018, a wave of social criticism arose when several people, including children, died during the heavy rains that caused floods in many areas of Luanda. This coincided with the publication of the yearly budget plan by the MPLA government, prioritizing defence and security over social spending (Schubert 2018b). The wave of criticism that started as an exposure of the hardship of life in the musseques (periferic neighbourhoods) spread through Luanda and was framed as “Acaba de me matar” (just killed me). These were photographs of people posted on social media, depicting them as killed by the failures of the ‘New Angola’ project; for instance, killed by blocks of concrete, or by gas bottles, drowned in puddles, or overwhelmed by books (referring to the price and access to scholarly materials, tuition fees, etc.).4
13Pentecostalism (broadly captured in terms of various Christian movements theologically prioritizing the works and gifts of the Holy Spirit) in Angola can be traced to the 1930s (Henderson 1990). However, according to oral histories collected in various churches, the real growth of Pentecostalism started in the late 1980s and the 1990s. A crucial fact in the development of Pentecostalism in Angola is that, in the late 1990s and the first decade of the 21st century, Angolan churches started missions in different parts of the world. For many Pentecostals, this proved the maturity of the movement. The presence of Angolan Pentecostals and the Tocoist Church in multiple places in Europe has been already well recognized (Blanes 2007, Sarró & Mélice 2010, Zawiejska & van de Kamp 2018). With its transnationalization, Angolan Pentecostalism became a significant platform for global circulations integrating Angola’s cities in the planetary Pentecostal network; this also legitimized it locally as an important shaping force in individual and citizenship formation.
14Still, it is difficult to estimate the real number of Pentecostals in Angola. The 2014 Census mentions that Catholics constitute 41.1% of the population and Protestants 38.1%.5 The difference is low and might be counted as a statistical error. Furthermore, the “Protestant” category used in the census is undefined. In all likelihood, it includes Protestant mainline churches, Pentecostal churches, AIC churches such as the Tocoist Church, and several other denominations loosely affiliated with the Protestant tradition. If the Catholic Church prevails statistically, its public presence outside the strict centre of Luanda is significantly less obvious than that of Protestantism. This is partially due to structural challenges regarding the planting and sustaining of new Roman Catholic parishes. Because of the ease with which Pentecostals organize new places of worship and their massive public presence in the city, Pentecostalism in Luanda should be considered as a valid actor (re)producing and at the same time refracting the Angolan social imaginaire and its further performances. This is particularly the case since Luanda is saturated by the Pentecostalite public culture (Meyer 2004) and is therefore a shaping force and a resource for both Pentecostals and non-Pentecostals.
Fig. 1. Pentecostal church in Luanda, member of CIRA
Natalia Zawiejska 2023
Fig. 2. Pentecostal church in Luanda, member of CIRA
Natalia Zawiejska 2023
- 6 US Department of State 2023, 2022 Report on International Religious Freedom: Angola, United States (...)
- 7 Ibid.
- 8 Ibid.
15In post-independence Angola, religion has always been strictly bound to state-governing policy. “Perhaps in fifty years there will be no more churches in Angola,” fantasized Agostinho Neto during the MPLA meeting on 21 February 1977 (Viegas 2007: 12). Later on, during the civil war, churches played a strategic role in the country’s social governance, filling the gap of state absence and securing social welfare (see Jensen & Pestana 2010, Péclard 2013). Today there are over 80 officially recognized churches.6 Over 1,000 institutions, including those representing Islam and multiple Pentecostal and African spiritual churches, still remain unrecognized. This huge disproportion makes recognized institutions important political players in relation to both the state and the overall religious landscape. The government claims them as partners in state social policy and considers them crucial in the shaping of moral citizenship. Representatives of several churches are members of the Council of the Republic, a President-appointed advisory board. The recognized institutions enjoy several privileges relating to freedom of worship and taxes.7 Large churches, including Pentecostal ones, are equally used as a political tool by governing forces, particularly when it comes to elections, building state-religion alliances, and supporting governmental social development campaigns linked to health, youth, and education. Religious institutions are shaped by the legislative policy that steers the public and social perceptions of the notion of legitimacy for particular religious groups. Equally, the public framing of illegal religious institutions, often called sects, as a potential threat to peace and social well-being goes hand in hand with state policy. Therefore, religious institutions strive for legitimization by organizing themselves through alternative networks such as the Conselho das Igrejas de Reavivamento de Angola (CIRA). According to Blanes (2015), the Angolan religious landscape is subject to severe state control and religious institutions are made to corroborate political ideology (2015). The case of Maná Church (Igreja Maná) and the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus, IURD) in Angola are both examples of state control over the distribution, social impact, and development of Pentecostal (neo-Pentecostal in both cases) churches. In 2008, Maná Church was outlawed by the state because of its financial policies and only recently, after internal changes, was it recognized as Igreja Josafat. Due to conflicts over Angolan leadership, in 2020, IURD churches were closed by the state and leaders filed a lawsuit, leaving behind several hundred followers and empty cathedrals.8 It is, however, important to see the relationship between Pentecostalism and the Angolan state as a rather complex and ambiguous one, going beyond the state regulations. The public expression of Pentecostalism in Luanda resonates with the state policy towards religious institutions in both ways: Pentecostal churches maintain the equilibrium in adjusting government policies and they operate as distorted spaces of state ideologies.
16The churches that are the focus of this article are both legally recognized and have been significantly present for many years in Luanda’s urban sphere. Both these churches are the result of historical missionary activities that operated from outside Angola, yet both were nationalized and registered as Angolan religious institutions. Their headquarters are in Luanda, and both churches have set up networks of parishes spread throughout the city, with distinct representation in each of Luanda’s neighbourhoods. Moreover, both churches have a presence in other provinces of Angola and have managed to build an international network. While they are both seen as Pentecostal churches, they represent different Pentecostal features, with the Assembly of God of Maculusso (ADM) being classified as classic Pentecostal and the Bom Deus church as an African Pentecostal church (see Blanes 2015, Blanes & Zawiejska 2020). ADM is one of the most recognizable Assemblies of God of Angola (AGA) churches, with historic links to Portuguese missions and headquarters which, for a long time, were located in one of central Luanda’s neighbourhoods – Maculusso. During the colonial era, the church was considered to be predominantly white and Portuguese. In recent years, its headquarters moved to Talatona. It is a church with middle-class aspirations, with many members working as state administration employees and in the education and private sectors. In turn, BD’s history can be traced back to the evangelization actions of Tommy Lee Osborn and Congolese leader Aidini Abala, who established the Nzambe Malamu church in Kinshasa. With many Angolans returning from Congo to Angola in the 1980s, after independence, Aidini sent an Angolan missionary, Simão Lutumba, to establish a mission in Luanda. When Aidini died in 1997, the Angolan BD Church separated from Nzambe Malamu, yet continued to bear the burden of the Congolese church in Angola. It was ethnically Bakongo-centred with headquarters located in the Congolese-dominated Palanca neighbourhood. In search for official recognition, Simão Lutumba reorganized the church, taking steps to revamp its image – spreading it throughout Angola’s provinces, gaining a multi-ethnic following, and changing the language of the services to those officially recognized by the state: Portuguese, Kikongo, and Kimbundu.
17Additionally, the Angolan Assemblies of God (AGA) appearing in this article is an umbrella organization for different autonomous Assemblies of God operating in Angola, through which they share a common superior authority (a president), common status, and a pastoral board deciding on important issues at the national level. At the beginning of my fieldwork, there were 15 different Assemblies of God operating in Luanda, the Assembly of God of Maculusso being one of them. The main leader of ADM, Rev. Francisco Domingos Sebastião, is now the head of AGA.
18I will begin with a vignette of the festivity of the anniversary of Luanda, giving an insight into the city as present in the Pentecostal imaginary. During a meeting of women’s associations of the AGA, many important issues were raised pertaining to the needs of families, the church community, society, and the nation. One intervention concerned the specific time of the meeting since it was held on 25 January 2014, the anniversary of the foundation of Luanda and a commemorative day. The meeting took place in the city centre, in the Coqueiros neighbourhood, a place undergoing rapid urban change, linked to Luanda’s oil-fuelled modernization. The local church, Nova Aliança, was chosen for the meeting as its location was associated with importance and serenity. However, the majority of the participants came from distant places, often from Luanda’s shantytowns. The city was preparing for its annual celebrations, involving music, dance, and unbridled entertainment – or at least, so it was seen in Pentecostal circles. The festive mood was not shared by the women gathered at the meeting; on the contrary, they saw it as a dangerous time, when malicious spiritual forces threatened them, potentially blocking the prosperity and well-being of the community and Angolan society. As one woman claimed, Luanda was initially dedicated to a spiritual being named Kianda – a mermaid held captive under water, and an important spirit in the cosmology of the Kimbundu, the original inhabitants of Luanda. Kianda is considered an affective spirit, granting protection, prosperity, and love – sometimes in the erotic sense. However, she can also become enraged, showing her malicious, dangerous, and destructive side. Some Luandans, especially the inhabitants of the Ilha de Luanda, therefore give offerings to Kianda to ensure her favour (Ribas 1958). Kianda has also become part of the popular imaginary, with enterprises such as local Radio Kianda named after her. In the Pentecostal imaginary, however, Kianda is an unambiguously evil and satanic force. “Luanda will never develop, because this is Kianda’s city,” said one woman. “We have to remain vigilant, pray to and beg God for protection, keep in contact with the Holy Spirit – it is our continual work and obligation.” This was considered to be the only way to resist and keep the city functioning, despite malicious, hidden powers. As another woman stated, the luxurious, modern look of the surrounding neighbourhood, where the gathering took place, might be misleading: it is important to look beyond the apparent beauty, glamour, and joy, even if these are desired, as they can also be illusions created by satanic forces to deceive and mislead.
Fig. 3. Women of AGA heading to Nova Aliança in Coqueiros
Natalia Zawiejska 2014
19A contrasting narrative was presented on the local television station reporting on the anniversary’s music show. In these narratives, Luanda was presented as a dynamic, lively city, full of opportunities, and its linear development towards wealth and economic prosperity was seen as motivated and desired by the city’s inhabitants. These visions contradicted the content of the final prayer in the Pentecostal women’s meeting, where the ultimate performance of the city and its inhabitants was considered to depend on transcendent reality. While praying for Luanda – “God, take care of this city, take control over it and pour out Your Spirit over it” (Field notes, 25.01.2014) – the women gave priority to the spiritual realm to control the city’s (in)visible infrastructures. In this type of case, ‘New Luanda’ becomes both another warfare tool in a spiritual battle for the city and a tricky enemy.
Fig. 4. Templo Internacional IFEPÁA Bom Deus, 3G
Natalia Zawiejska 2023
Fig. 5. Bom Deus church interior
Natalia Zawiejska 2023
20Another vignette complements the Pentecostal enactments of ‘New Luanda’. In 2019, the new temple of BD Church was inaugurated in the Bakhita Kosi neighbourhood. The temple was one of BD leader Simão Lutumba’s main infrastructure projects. While his church received state recognition and spread to various places in Angola and beyond, its headquarters remained in the Palanca neighbourhood. The land allotted by the church for the new construction was large and unexpectedly spacious in the densely populated area of Sapú. It was an old dumping ground, plain, with no other constructions. As a result, the high block of the temple now dominates the landscape. “It is like a meteorite from heaven that landed here!” explained one of the young members of the congregation. The church has an unusual rounded shape, and next to one of the entrances there is a plaque that reads: “Temple of the Modern and Unique Architecture in Africa”. At the same time, in front of the church, another plaque states: “Temple constructed by the Word of God; Exodus 25: 1-2:8; Exodus 35:4-5; Haggai 2:7-8; 12-24”. Both happen to represent BD programmatic engagements and belongings. This new localization promised to move the church out of the stigmatized area, but most of all it was thought to embody a new BD spirit. The temple was named “International Temple”, but the less official name is “3G”, meaning Third Generation Church, marking a new phase for BD Christians and a new subjectivity for a younger generation that is independent, well educated, organized, and successful. In many ways, the 3G narrative has intersected with ‘New Man’ ideals for an idealized Angolan citizen, and this 3G temple seems to be a clear embodiment of ‘New Luanda’ ideals. “Sometimes I wonder if this is a church or a city!” said a confused member when I approached him on the meaning of 3G. Indeed 3G grew as a religious and modern social hub, a symbol recognized by church members spread throughout different parts of the world. Inside the building, there are different spaces such as a canteen, a smaller meeting room, offices, a bookstore with an exhibition space, a spacious hall, and a media department room. The church has running water, its own Internet network, and air-conditioning. There is an ushering department with security guards who wear formal suits and earphones. Entrance to the church is controlled and seems to follow a strict protocol, similar to that of government and administrative facilities. There are several passages and red carpets that are reserved for particular occasions or important leaders. There is also an exhibition showing the development of the church and depicting the evolution of the chairs used by the main leader: from a plastic chair in an early poor shack church to the golden throne that Simão Lutumba used just before he passed away, showing a straight line of material upgrading conflated with the growth of the church. The church has a modern media section, which transmits services and new programmes such as interviews with leaders revealing the history of the church. Many young people are now involved in church activities and volunteer in or are employed by the church. A particular space in church media is devoted to presenting the Quadros de Boa Nova (Gospel images), success stories depicting particular members of the church who hold prominent roles in Angolan society, such as teachers, lawyers, writers, scholars, etc.
Fig. 6. Bom Deus development through materialities, chairs used by Simão Lutumba
Natalia Zawiejska 2023
Fig. 7. Media unit of Bom Deus church
Natalia Zawiejska 2014
21However, the path to the church is still uneasy, as the main road leading to the church is rammed earth, which floods during heavy rains and impedes many members from reaching the services on time. “I was almost jailed because of this road,” said one of the principal pastors, narrating his negotiations to upgrade the road with the local authorities. While the church used to invite governing authorities during the Palanca period to take part in healing campaigns and visit the church, there was a gradual breakdown in state-church relations. Simão Lutumba decided to build the church independently, without any support from the state, out of donations from members. It was thought that it would keep the state as distant as possible. However, the state soon struck back. According to church sources, when the temple was being inaugurated, Lutumba was informed by a local police officer that, if he left his home, blood might be shed. There were several police checkpoints, with tear gas and dogs, particularly at the entrance of Bakhita Kosi, near the Kimbangu area. While, in the new temple, several thousand guests waited for the leader, he did not manage to pass and was taken to the police station. According to the local newspapers, Lutumba was accused of disobedience and resistance and demonstrating disrespect to state authorities – the National Police. Lutumba decided to proceed with the inauguration of the church despite a juridical ban, wherein the Chinese company that had constructed the church claimed it as a debtor. The explanation given by the church on those events is that the police were used by evil forces, managed by witchcraft.
22In both vignettes, ‘New Luanda’ becomes an invisible infrastructure enacted in a legitimizing struggle for authority, control, and recognition. It becomes an operational code and communicative tool in regard to socio-spatial location and claiming one’s social space. At the same time, materialities and built infrastructure seem to steer the immaterial realm. However, adopting the style that conforms with the architectural refurbishment of ‘New Luanda’ might serve other religious and social purposes. Tackled as the aesthetics of persuasion, Birgit Meyer demonstrates how the Pentecostal religious realm is attuned to material concerns, with aesthetic style becoming a potent force (2004). When transposed to Luanda’s religious material forms, such as temples and objects, Luanda’s religious landscape appears not only in terms of one-way compliance with ‘New Luanda’ ideals, but also in dialogical terms. On the one hand, as the example of the AGA meeting in Coqueiros shows, the infrastructure of ‘New Luanda’ makes Pentecostal ideas legitimate when attuned to the forms of the ‘New Luanda’ project. However, the women gathered there suggested that God might “open the door” (abrir as portas) to personal or community development and progress when he considers it eligible and right. Such understanding complicates the ‘New Luanda’ imaginary by adding another dimension, which legitimizes different layers of tapping into the system and justifies failures. In fact, it is God who decides when, if, and how the tapping into ‘New Luanda’ project will or will not occur. The BD case represents a backlash against state dominance, and ‘New Luanda’ is employed to maintain the equilibrium of a church’s own religious ontology. As such, BD’s enacting of ‘New Luanda’ might be read as an exemplary case of the skilful adaptation of ‘New Luanda’ infrastructures and narratives that might keep the state away. Several statements that I have collected verify this interpretation: ‘3G’ marks another era in the spiritual development of the church. Specifically, it refers to time measured according to the Bible, when the third era (Third Generation) should be the return of Christ.
- 9 The names of my interlocutors have been changed.
23After 2010, many Angolans who had migrated to Portugal several years prior (during or shortly after the civil war) started returning to Angola. One of these was José,9 who returned to Luanda from Lisbon and managed to find a temporary room at his friends’ modern home in Kilamba, over 30 kilometres from the centre of Luanda. José had migrated to Lisbon some years before, but the economic crisis in Portugal that coincided with the oil boom in Angola prompted him, as it did many others, to return to Luanda to look for work, if only temporary, while his family remained in Lisbon. José was one of the founders of the Assembly of God of Maculusso parish in Lisbon, which was initially an informal prayer group consisting of migrants who “grew up spiritually” in AGM in Luanda. For my interlocutors, Maculusso meant both a place – a parish, either in Luanda or Lisbon – and an imaginary space of spiritual belonging.
24Soon after José’s return to Luanda, he began to visit the headquarters of the church located in the middle-class Maculusso neighbourhood in the city centre. There, he was welcomed and remembered from his early years. He insisted on taking part in services at AGM’s city centre headquarters, even though he lived over 30 kilometres away and had no means of transport. Given Luanda’s poor transport system and heavy traffic, he had to set out for church several hours before the service began. During my months in Luanda, I observed that many people came to AGM’s central church from distant bairros in Luanda, preferring the distant, centrally located church to the parish churches that were much closer to where they lived.
25Yet not everyone who was “from Maculusso” was able to travel so far. As I realized after visiting several Maculusso parishes located in the bairros, for those who for whatever reason preferred to stay close to their homes, attending services in one of the Maculusso parishes located in the poor or informal neighbourhoods of Luanda was linked to a specific imaginary about Maculusso that was trans-territorial and considered to belong to the “Maculusso Family”. Irrespective of the actual location, Maculusso was wherever Maculusso Family members met and prayed together. In this sense the Maculusso Family constituted a map grid, both material (in the shape of particular churches) and imagined (in terms of spiritual connectivity). ’In addition to being an important imaginary, the Maculusso Family materializes twice a year at the meeting that takes place at Cidadela, a sports facility in Luanda, where the Maculusso identity is invoked and celebrated. At such meetings, devotees engage in a day-long prayer meeting linked with performances and invocations of Maculusso achievements, history, and memories. AGM’s European heritage and association with the historic middle-class of Luanda, its central location in the Maculusso neighbourhood (which is today one of the epicentres of ‘New Luanda’ with offices, residences, and Portuguese restaurants), and the newly built headquarters of AGM in another emblematic ‘New Luanda’ spatiality – Talatona – bring into play substantial symbolic and social capital, allowing AGM to be seen as a tool with which to tap into the ‘New Luanda’ development and citizenship project. Moreover, members of Assemblies of God in Luanda retain the memory of AGM’s spatial practices during the colonial period. African devotees were then allowed to come to the AGM headquarters in the city centre to take the Lord’s Supper together with Europeans. The same practices of socio-spatial upgrading through ignoring and transgressing socio-spatial divisions of colonial Luanda are present in the mobility practices of the current Maculusso Family.
Fig. 8. Maculusso Family meeting in Cidadela
Natalia Zawiejska 2014
Fig. 9. Friday service in Bom Deus Church
Natalia Zawiejska 2023
26For instance, in February 2014, I attended a meeting of the Women’s Association at AGM headquarters in the Maculusso neighbourhood, where the leading Mama encouraged other women to circulate and visit other congregations during local Women’s Association meetings, exhorting:
Sister, do not feel better because you work in a bank: do not feel better because you consider that bairro bad, or you feel that it is not your culture [alluding to Bakongo-dominated quarters].
We have to be present and show solidarity with other sisters. Before God we are all equal. There is no point in being present only in our community, in isolation, in your luxury. We are all virtuous women, women of fire, full of the Holy Spirit. And He does not make mundane distinctions […]. If God is with us, who would be against us? Mama, assume your responsibility! (Field notes, 30.01.2014)
27Given that the women’s meetings of the Maculusso Family in Luanda regularly take place in different parts of the city, they encompass multiple urban spatialities that are excluded by ‘New Luanda’. This allows vast groups of Maculusso Family members to be included in and attuned to the state’s vision of the middle-class, akin to the “sense tuning” practices and the “immediatism culture” previously described. These practices include poor neighbourhoods, lower-class citizens, people of various ethnicities, and many other people who for various reasons do not feel part of ‘New Luanda’ project in their everyday lives.
28However, as observed in the case of José and another man, João, both attending the AGM, at the time of my research, many AGM members did not only tap into ‘New Luanda’ through the AGM. Both of these men tried to find access to effective participation in the ‘New Luanda’ order through different connections. In João’s case, having been born into a Bakongo family living near the Mercado of Kwanza (a peripheral neighbourhood dominated by the Bakongo), he saw the post-war political reconstruction project as an attractive framework on which to set his life goals. João had been trying to tap into the ‘New Luanda’ model of progression, yet his limited resources and social location worked against his dreams. As he told me, Luanda’s luxury was calling him, inspiring him to undertake several initiatives aimed at gaining him inclusion into ‘New Luanda’. I observed João’s efforts in Luanda. He would present me with photos and tell stories of his visits to the five-star Sana hotel in the centre of Luanda, where he had attended multiple events, particularly those connected with the fashion industry. This inspired him to set up a fashion and modelling company, with headquarters situated in the Maculusso neighbourhood. The company did not last due to the lack of financial fluidity and poor connections to the right people, as João saw it. João also tried entering the television business, considering such a job prestigious and closely linked to what he imagined as a “full and good life”. Working for local TV stations would elevate João to a life that he saw modelled on Angolan TV shows. Even though he did manage to gain some minor contracts, he was unable to secure the stable employment that he expected. Once, he told me about his despair at ever being able to find the right “entry” point into the system, admitting that all his diplomas had been falsified in the Pau Grande locality, which was well known for providing such services. He believed that certified educational attainment, as promoted by the government’s development model, might be one of the options through which to fulfil his aspirations. He attempted other means, attending expensive bars and nightlife events in the luxury Ilha de Luanda neighbourhood. He even once rented a one-room apartment in Ilha (though he could only afford the rent for one month), as he thought that being in the right locality would recoup his investment and lead to further profits. During his multiple efforts, he continued to attend AGM. João became familiar with AGM, drawing on his migratory life in Lisbon. He became loosely integrated into the Maculusso Family. Without great faith in Pentecostalism (his family being divided between the Tocoist Church and AGA), he decided to include AGM as one of the ways of tapping into the desired ‘New Luanda’ world, as a possible vehicle. When I was leaving Luanda, João was still managing the different opportunities and evaluating new possibilities.
29The two preceding ethnographic sections confirm that ‘New Luanda’ constitutes an ideological structure shaping Pentecostal practice in Luanda. The example from AGM shows how institutional Pentecostal practice and the Pentecostal parish network infrastructure are used by AGM members as vehicles to tap into the sought-after ‘New Luanda’ social space. This happens because the ‘New Luanda’ imaginary has been embodied and is steering infrastructure developments and the progress discourse of many Pentecostal churches, such as AGM. In turn, the AGA women’s meeting in Coqueiros reveals that the intersections of the Pentecostal realm and the ideology of the political state are complex and cannot easily be explained in terms of Pentecostal adjustment to the neoliberal and capitalist development model and the ‘New Man’ subjectivity. They also cannot be reduced to the state’s control over religious institutions. Even if the Pentecostal development ethos is often interpreted as receptive to and resonating with neoliberal discourse (Freeman 2012), in the BD case, the ‘New Luanda’ project is employed to maintain the church’s socio-religious space clear from state control and management. At least two main framings of Pentecostalism flow from its analysis from the perspective of urban practice. First is the enactment and embodiment of ‘New Luanda’ into a church’s own religious imaginary and practice. As such, the religious space follows ‘New Luanda’ ideals. The second one is the diverting of ‘New Luanda’ to establish an alternative space, a rebel space where ‘New Luanda’ remains a tool for maintaining the independence of the socio-religious space.
30All the cases studied prove that Pentecostalism is an urban social formation that has grown out of life in Luanda. As such, Pentecostalism should be analysed in comparison with other contemporary social movements and urban formations in Luanda, particularly their practices of management and resistance towards the state’s governing policies and practices.
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