To say she was a practicing Catholic would be an understatement. For years, Maria Aparecida Calazans was a mainstay at her Long Island church, joining dozens of fellow Brazilian immigrants for the Portuguese language Mass on Sunday mornings. She and her husband, Ramon, were married at the church. Their two daughters were baptized there, and every Friday she attended a prayer meeting that she had helped organize.<\/p>\n
But six years ago, her husband went to a relative\u2019s baptism at a Pentecostal church in a warehouse in Astoria, Queens, and came home smitten.<\/p>\n
The couple made a deal. \u201cWe would go to the Pentecostal service on Thursdays and to Mass on Sundays, and then we would decide which one we felt most comfortable with,\u201d\u009d Mrs. Calazans said.<\/p>\n
Within 40 days, they had given up Roman Catholicism and embraced Pentecostalism, following the path of the estimated 1.3 million Latino Catholics who have joined Pentecostal congregations since immigrating to the United States, according to a survey released in February by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel whole here,\u201d\u009d Mrs. Calazans, 42, said one recent Sunday in the Astoria sanctuary, the Portuguese Language Pentecostal Missionary Church, as she swayed to the pop-rock beat of a live gospel band. \u201cThis church is not a place we visit once a week. This church is where we hang around and we share our problems and we celebrate our successes, like we were family.\u201d\u009d<\/p>\n