CROSSROADS: THE MEETING OF THE CAÓ LAW AND THE JUDICIARY: A LOOK AT RELIGIOUS RACISM

Abstract

Religious racism in Brazil has been a persistent and perverse form of discrimination, reflecting the marginalization of Afro-Brazilian religions and their practitioners. The research problem of this paper is to analyze how the Brazilian State, even after legislative advances, continues to reproduce religious racism through omission and institutional violence, especially in the Judiciary. The general objective is to investigate the effectiveness of laws to combat racism in confronting the violence suffered by people of terreiro. The qualitative method was used, based on bibliographic review, document analysis and case study, with the case of Mother Bernadete de Oxóssi as the main reference. The research indicates that, although there are legal advances such as the Caó Law and the Statute of Racial Equality, the effectiveness of these norms still encounters structural, symbolic and institutional barriers. It is concluded that the eradication of religious racism will depend on a structural transformation, which includes social awareness, effective accountability of public agents and historical reparation of traditional peoples of African origin.