Priest targeted by the PF denies link to coup plot – 02/09/2024 – Power

The target of a Federal Police operation this Thursday (8), Father José Eduardo de Oliveira e Silva used his social networks to deny involvement in a coup plot and even announced a donation to buy new equipment, as his cell phone and computer were seized.

According to the decision of Minister Alexandre de Moraes, of the STF (Supreme Federal Court), the priest is mentioned as a member of the legal core of the scheme. The PF’s action targeted former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) and his surroundings, with search and arrest warrants — former advisors Marcelo Câmara and Filipe Martins were arrested.

In his decision, Moraes mentions that the priest participated in a meeting in Planalto with Martins in November 2022. The minister states that, as pointed out by the police authority, the priest has a website with his name “on which it was possible to verify various links with people and companies already investigated in inquiries related to the production and dissemination of fake news”.

With 299 thousand followers on Instagram and 90 thousand on YouTube, the priest turned to the platforms after the search and seizure. The profile still shows images from 2022, when he displayed a Brazilian flag on the altar.
In a note of clarification, the religious states that the Republic is secular and constitutional duties must be respected.

“Breaking with the established order would be deeply contrary to my principles. Below God, in our country, is the Federal Constitution. Therefore, I did not cooperate or endorse any act disrupting the Constitution”, he states.

“As a professor of moral theology, I have always taught that the positive law must be obeyed by the faithful, among whom I humbly include myself”, he continues.

In Stories, the profile displayed a message warning that the religious was incommunicado, due to the search and seizure, and provided a Pix key for anyone who wanted to “help the priest acquire new communication equipment”.

On Thursday night, the priest did a live on YouTube, using borrowed equipment. For almost ten minutes, he sought to reassure the faithful, saying they had nothing to fear and had a clear conscience. And he stated that, as a theologian and philosopher, he is consulted by people across the country, including authorities.

“Mayors, councilors, deputies, judges, judges, federal and state deputies, senators. In short, I serve all people who ask for my spiritual assistance because that is my mission.”

Before closing, he reaffirmed his position in defense of life and in favor of the family.

“I want to take this opportunity to reaffirm my absolutely unquestionable and also unequivocal position in defense of life, against abortion —this has always been a flag for which I fought—, in favor of the family, against ideologies that seek to deconstruct people’s identities, in favor of those principles that we are all called as Christians, and in my case as a priest, to defend with courage”, he said.

In 2022, the priest took a Brazilian flag to the altar. Publications show the flag under images of Our Lady — one of them on October 2, the day of the presidential election.

In September of the same year, on the eve of the elections, a video published on the profile shows the priest telling the faithful that the choice at the polls would impact how the Gospel would be spread in the coming years.

“It is not my mission to indicate who you have to vote for. That is your conscience that has to choose. But, as a Church, we have to say: your choice determines our freedom to preach. Your choice determines how the Gospel will be widespread in the coming years.”

On January 8, 2023, the day of the coup attacks on the headquarters of the three Powers, the parish priest told the biblical story of Absalom, son of David, who died after an armed revolt against his father.

“Behind Absalom’s subversive act there is a history of injustice and omission, of protection from crime and inhumane delinquencies. Judging history by the end is treating the symptom as the cause. There is no way to heal a wound without treating it by its origin” , he wrote.

Also last year, a publication that featured his face, an image of Our Lady and the Brazilian flag, said that the 7th of September arrived “strange, sad and dark”. “This just reminds me of the phrase: ‘the solution for Brazil is not in Brasília, but in Aparecida’. We need to pray,” he wrote.