election day in brasil

It is election day here in Brasil. Since my arrival I have been handed candidate flyers daily in the favela and throughout the city. It is common to see people waving candidate flags and banners at intersections. Today there must have been a lot of left over flyers to distribute on the streets, because I could hardly walk to church with all the volunteers handing them out and throwing them up in the air. Normally, the streets have been littered with flyers, but today you could hardly even see the asphalt in one area. Maybe there is a commission or quota on the number of flyers you pass out. It might have been fun to see how many I could collect today. Ha!

Anyway, it is a Presidential election, as well as state and local. At this point in the election results, it looks like the current President, Lula, will not get a majority vote and face a run-off with the second place candidate. Looks like the flyer fun has not ended yet. Today, since we could not vote, the staff here spent time praying to the country and newly elected officials. May they be men and women with integrity and seek to respond to the needs of the poor and oppressed.