The samba school on their site ‘Carnavalesco’ stated that the school was presenting an Arabian legend about the origin of tobacco, with the character of Saint Antão.

The legend declares that this saint spent his life travelling around Africa spreading the word of God. As an adult, he found an injured and suffering serpent. He took it home and cared for the animal. When the snake recovered, it bit the arm of its rescuer. The saint having cast away the serpent, sucked out the poison from his own wound. A tobacco plant appeared at the site of the bite which led to the tale of the origins of tobacco.

Even with this legend in mind, some commentators said that the person in the samba school’s main scene with a cloth around his loins and with a crown of thorns on his head represented Jesus and not the saint.

Right after the performance, the choreographer, and some of those involved in the scene spoke on television about the performance and admitted that the main character of the scene was in fact Jesus Christ.

“We wanted to shock the spectators. This pivotal scene was unconceivable, and we achieved our goal. We wanted to make people think about their faith using this scene of Jesus and the Devil,” confirmed Edgar Junior, the choreographer of the performance.

The production provoked anger on social networks, where many Christians criticised the performance and called it profane.

Fr. Augusto Bezerra, a Catholic priest of the Archdiocese of Rio de Janeiro, wrote on his Facebook account:  

“The person who invented this scene about the victory of the Devil over God, stopped watching the series before the last episode. Let me ruin it for him: the fallen angel was cast down with his associates to hell; they were trodden upon by the innocent Lamb.”

Fr. José Eduardo, from the Diocese of Osasco (SP) also spoke about the event on his social network sites. He wrote that this kind of mockery shows the Devil attempting to desensitise souls for his own evil purpose.

Source: Acidigital