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Christianity can emerge to compete within the sphere of culture\u2019 (1990: 294). He points out that \u2018Pentecostalism as well other forms of Evangelicalism enable many of the members to achieve power in their lives which can simultaneously infuse them with the possibility of \u201Cbetterment\u201D and of new goods of every kind, spiritual and material\u2019. (1990: 204).\u000AOn the contrary, Jean-Pierre Bastian believes that the current expressions of Protestantism are a kind of palliative to help the poor to survive. He affirms that even though the Pentecostal lay person can raise his standard of living, he does not reach an ethical rationalization which would allow him to structure economic components. He goes on to point out that religious movements like Pentecostalism \u2018contribute to combat misery, but do not eradicate poverty\u2019 (1997: 209-210). Bastian says that the present flowering of religious heterodoxy in Latin America is due to the transplant of the \u2018popular religion\u2019 to be found in rural Catholicism with no priestly oversight (1993: 35). Cox shows that Pentecostalism cannot be interpreted unilaterally. He points out that \u2018the Pentecostal movement itself is a highly paradoxical one. It is diverse, volatile and mercurial. It will not sit still long enough for someone to paint its portrait, or stop changing long enough for anyone to chart its trajectory\u2019 (1996: 183-184).\u000AOn the other hand, Ireland\u2019s studies of some religious groups in Brazil show that they develop certain kinds of \u2018political culture\u2019. This political culture consists of beliefs, stories and images that emerge and operate from the grass roots, in every day life, in poor neighbourhoods and in popular religion (1991: 3, 7, 43). These politics allow Brazilian Catholics, Protestant Pentecostals, and spiritists \u2018to interpret and modify the political- economic realities they cannot control. [...] They set up as much as they can of their religiously inspired kingdoms in the free spaces available to them, and [...] live patterns of citizenship that they themselves construct\u2019 (1991: 4).\u000AThe researcher observed that the NPCs emerged in an adverse social, economic and political context. They grew in spite of limitations and pressures that the social structures\u000A8\u000A