Last night I (Dave) went to a Spiritist gathering at Lake Pampulha (a huge lake in Belo Horizonte) with 4 others from this YWAM base. The spritists were there to celebrate the incarnation of their God of Water and there were many of them, all dressed in white, playing drums with a samba rhythm, chanting, swaying and generally being fairly weird. We were there to evangelise and pray against what was going on.
This kind of thing attracts people from all over the city as it is quite a cultural experience. It is possible for the ordinary citazen to go to one of these Macumba groups where someone can pray for them to receive power, receive healing or just to be blessed. Then the person praying would invite spirits into the person for them to receive what they are asking for. It was an intense atmosphere, thick with the action of the unseen. We stayed there for about 2 hours, arriving back home around 12.40am. It is difficult to know how much detail about this to put on the blog because I am aware that this is open for all to read, therefore if you have any questions then please ask it in the comment section and I will respond fully to your enquiry as best as I can. But one thing was for sure: I learnt a lot more about waging spiritual war and about the hold that this form of spiritism has on this nation of Brazil.