In 2023, supporters of Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro violently stormed the capital in an attempted coup. Among Bolsonaro’s most loyal supporters were leaders in the União do Vegetal, one of Brazil’s oldest and most popular ayahuasca churches. Brazil’s laws state that electoral propaganda is forbidden inside temples and churches but former União do Vegetal members say they experienced what some called brainwashing while in an altered state.
Psychedelics are now at the center of a global conversation about mental health, mysticism, and even how we experience illness and death. In Altered States, host Arielle Duhaime-Ross explores how people are taking these drugs, who has access to them, how they’re regulated, who stands to profit, and what these substances might offer us as individuals and as a society. Listen to more episodes here.
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Ana Duarte [00:00:03] Já tinha caminho, já fazia tempo que eu buscava conforto espiritual, meditação, eu fiz ragioga.
Speaker 2 [00:00:11] I had been seeking spiritual comfort for some time. I did meditation, Raja Yoga. I tried going into spiritism, but didn’t really like it. After some time I heard of someone who was drinking the tea and asked this person to take me along to a session. I was blown away. That one session felt like ten years of therapy.
Ana Duarte [00:00:35] A sessão valeu por dez anos de terapia.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:00:38] Ana Duarte was 51 the first time she tried ayahuasca. She was a politically progressive type, a banker and a poet who lived in Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil. In the early 2000s, Ana stumbled upon a group of people, a psychedelic church, called União do Vegetal, Portuguese for Union of the Plants. People call it the UDV, or the Union for short. Vegetal is one of their names for ayahuasca. Ana was so moved by her experience that she immediately joined.
Ana Duarte [00:01:14] Encantou na União foi realmente o trabalho conjunto shama mutiram.
Speaker 2 [00:01:20] What really captivated me in the UDV was the collective work. We had a sense of community. The preparations of ayahuasca felt like celebrations.
Ana Duarte [00:01:31] Que eram verdadeiras festas realmente.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:01:35] Ayahuasca is a psychoactive brew made from a vine and a plant used in the UDV ceremonies. For over twenty years, Ana drank the tea and rituals every two weeks. She felt she had found her people, until one day in 2018, Ana attended an ayahuasca session led by a high ranking master or mestre in the church, ninety one year old Raimundo Monteiro de Souza.
Ana Duarte [00:02:02] Mas estava todo mundo sob efeito. Era uma sessão da união. Todo mundo sob efeito da.
Speaker 2 [00:02:08] Everyone was under the influence of ayahuasca, like in every session. It started off with chanting and then he said these things during the sermon. The session started off
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:02:19] Off like normal. But what Monteo said next shocked her.
Ana Duarte [00:02:24] E ele falou que o Bolsonaro era o candidato que devia se votar em Bolsonaro.
Speaker 2 [00:02:30] He said Bolsonaro was his candidate that he knew what reвоtionaries were like, and people on the left wanted communism. He praised the armed forces and the military.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:02:44] Twenty eighteen was the year of a highly contentious presidential election in Brazil between the left wing workers’ party and a hard right candidate named Jair Bolsonaro, who came to be known as the Trump of the Tropics.
[00:02:57] The Trump of the Tropics, the President of Brazil, Mr. Jai Bolsonaro.
Archival News Clip [00:03:01] Nós somos a maioria! Nós somos o Brasil de verdade!
Archival News Clip [00:03:07] Jair Bolsonaro. Supporters love his plain speaking style and hard stance on crime. Opponents fear his intolerance of activists, minorities, and ambivalence to the environment.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:03:19] For some UDV members, like Ana, twenty eighteen was the year that she and many others would begin to see their sacred psychedelic church in a different light.
Ana Duarte [00:03:34] Porque quando tem essas sessões com mestres antigos.
Speaker 2 [00:03:38] Many people had driven in from other states, which is common when you have sessions with eldest mestres. Some stood up in the middle of the session and drove off.
Ana Duarte [00:03:48] Nossa senhora.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:03:50] These were people in an altered state, hallucinating from a powerful psychedelic. And despite that, they got in their cars and drove away. But not Ana. Yes, she too was horrified by the political message, but in that moment, she stayed.
Arielle Duhaime-Ross [00:04:09] This week on the show, we go to Brazil. Reporter Julia Dias Carneiro takes us inside the UDV, a psychedelic church that claims to be nonpartisan and apolitical. But what transpired inside some UDV sessions during this highly polarized election and its aftermath seems to indicate otherwise. All of a sudden, things were getting decidedly partisan. I’m Arielle Duhaime-Ross and this is Altered States. Julia takes it from here.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:04:42] In 2018, Jair Bolsonaro took Brazil by storm. He promoted gun ownership, endorsed torture in Brazil’s former dictatorship, and espoused sexist and racist views. But he appealed to conservative voters by defending the traditional family and promising to crack down on corruption. Brazilian journalist Carlos Minuano was taking notes.
Carlos Minuano [00:05:10] Meu nome é Carlos Minuano, eu sou jornalista.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:05:14] For over twenty years, Carlos has been following psychedelics and the UDV. He contributed reporting to this episode, and he says he noticed something strange in the lead up to the Bolsonaro.
Carlos Minuano [00:05:27] A partir de dois mil e dezoito.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:05:29] Starting from twenty eighteen, there were signs of a right wing psychedelia on social media, which started to pick up in the final stretch of the presidential campaign when Bolsonaro was elected. And this was very evident among the followers of the UDV.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:05:45] Carlos realized that people on the outside had no idea about this, so he began covering it.
Carlos Minuano [00:05:51] Em dois mil, a primeira reportagem sobre o DV dentro desse contexto.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:05:58] Twenty, I published my first piece about how this far right psychedelia was gaining traction inside the União do Vegetal. People approached me to say they were grateful to see this come out because there was a deep sense of discomfort, but no one had spoken up publicly until then.
Carlos Minuano [00:06:16] Tinha trazido isso.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:06:19] That divisive presidential election caused the rift inside the UDV. An estimated 2,000 members have left the religion, among them 150 of its director. So, how did one of Brazil’s oldest and most popular ayahuasca religions, founded to promote, quote, love and human fraternity, end up spreading right wing propaganda to people in an altered state? To understand how the UDV changed, you have to go back to the early days of the religion.
Archival Tape (Mestre Garbiel) [00:06:49] Quando criou na cristal, foi com esse pensamento de fazer uma paz no mundo.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:06:59] This is the voice of José Gabriel da Costa. Mestre Gabriel, when he created the UDV in 1961, it was with this thought, he says, to make peace in the world. Mestre Gabriel migrated from Brazil’s poor northeast to the Amazon during the Second World War. He was one of the soldados da borracha or rubber soldiers drafted to tap rubber in the rainforest for the United States war effort. It was in the Amazon that Mestre Gabriel first encountered ayahuasca. This video produced by the UDV describes his vision.
Archival Tape (UDV Institutional Video) [00:07:36] The beneficent spirit of center, União do Vegetal, works for the development of the human being in the spiritual, moral, and intellectual sense.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:07:46] The UDV has grown to more than 25,000 members today, in over 200 units called núcleos. There are now núcleos in eleven countries, including the US, Canada, Switzerland, and Australia. In fact, in 2000, the UDV sued the US government for the right to use ayahuasca. The case went all the way to the US Supreme Court, and in 2006, they won.
Bia Labate [00:08:12] The biggest and most influential ayahuasca Brazilian religions, and it became famous because it won the right to consume ayahuasca legally in the United States, which is not a small task.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:08:25] Brazilian anthropologist Bia Labate has been researching the ayahuasca field for almost thirty years. She’s the executive director of the Chacruna Institute for Psychedelic Plant Medicines, a non profit advocacy group based in San Francisco. Bia describes the UDV’s spiritual doctrine as a mix of a few different things.
Bia Labate [00:08:45] In broad terms you could say Amerindian shamanism, the use of ayahuasca with popular Catholicism, elements of European esoteric traditions, as well as some Afro religion elements. I think it manages to talk to people from different backgrounds from more humble rubber taper traditional populations from inside the Amazon forest to a wider range of liberal professionals, medical doctors, artists, intellectuals, people from big cities. It has a kind of poetry to it and appeal that with some kind of magical enchanted element from the forest and indigenous people.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:09:32] Brazil recognized the noncommercial cultural and religious use of ayahuasca almost four decades ago. Mestre Gabriel died in nineteen seventy one, but he’s still the religion’s central figure. His picture hangs in all of the UDV’s temples.
Bia Labate [00:09:48] Every single congregation, you know, will prepare their brew and plant the brew. And then you have children, grandparents, parents, cousins, the whole family together cooking ayahuasca.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:10:01] These special brewing sessions happen throughout the year. Followers also attend regular ceremonies every two weeks on Saturday night. They go on for about four hours. Everyone but the highest ranking masters wear green shirts to the sessions, and the color of the UDV logo embroidered on the shirt pocket indicates one’s rank. There are four different ranks in the UDV. At the very top are the mestres or masters. At the bottom are the quote white pockets, the beginners. You can be promoted up or demoted down as punishment. At the start of the session, everyone lines up to receive a cup of ayahuasca. The top ranking members go first. While the brew kicks in, the mestres read out regulations and teachings.
Hymn of União do Vegetal [00:10:47] Querido fique nessa nossa caminhada, cantando indo uma palavra de amor. Sinto no peito a mão dessa bandeira, que é a luz, a paz e o amor, sinto no peito amor dessa bandeira, que é a luz, a paz e o amor.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:11:09] Then they listen to music or chance. This is one of the UDV’s anthems. The chorus highlights the group’s motto Light, Peace and Love. Officially, the UDV defines itself as nonpartisan and apolitical, which is in line with Brazil’s laws. Like the United States, Brazil’s constitution protects the freedom of religion. But in Brazilian law, electoral propaganda is forbidden inside temples and churches. So in the Bolsonaro era, when things got politicized in a new way, it wasn’t simply shocking for UDV members, there were questions of legality too.
Recording of Mestre Monteiro [00:11:46] Meus filhos e irmãos na União do Vegetal.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:11:50] During the twenty eighteen presidential elections, UDV members passed around a voice message from one of the UDV’s most senior figures, Raimondo Monteiro de Souza.
Recording of Mestre Monteiro [00:11:59] O único candidato capaz de afastar a desorte atualmente presente no Brasil é o Bolsonaro.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:12:08] It was a pitch to vote for Bolsonaro, the only person who could fix what he saw as the country’s problems problems like gay parades, abortion and gender ideology. He added that these were his views and the views of the UDV.
Recording of Mestre Monteiro [00:12:23] Dois pensamentos aqui que é mais meu, quando eu falo eu, mas todos são os pensamentos da União do Vegetal.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:12:29] According to Carlos, the journalist, the message was significant because of Montero’s influence in the U D V.
Carlos Minuano [00:12:36] Que ele é uma espécie assim de. É como se fosse, comparando com a Igreja Católica, dos apóstolos de Jesus.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:12:42] In an analogy with the Catholic Church, he’s like one of Jesus’ apostles. He was very close to Master Gabriel, the founder of the religion, and to this day holds a very strong influence.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:12:55] Bolsonaro won the election later that year.
Archival News Clip [00:13:04] Hundreds of people have gathered outside Jair Bolsonaro’s apartment. They’re chanting the national anthem and celebrating.
Carlos Minuano [00:13:12] Into longer do governo Bolsonaro, as coisas foram piorando na UDV e eu fui procurado por dirigentes.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:13:20] During the Bolsonaro administration, things started getting worse in the UDV, and some leaders who were against the growing pro Bolsonaro support reached out to me. They decided to write a letter that they wanted to make public.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:13:35] The group called itself Paz com Voz, Peace with Voice. The letter raised concern over support in the UDV’s upper ranks for quote political positions contrary to the teachings of the master. It called for an end to political partisanship and for a return to neutrality. The letter didn’t mention Bolsonaro by name, but listed some of his hallmark ideas that were embraced by UDV leaders, including the rollback of environmental protections, even when ayahuasca is made from two plants native to the Amazon rainforest. The group handed the letter to the UDV’s Master General Representative, its highest authority, but they never got an answer. One of the members who wrote the letter told me that he was downgraded in the UDV’s ranks as punishment. He told me the UDV’s rules forbid discussing politics in sessions, but there are double standards and some people get away with it. He was so upset, he decided to sue the UDV for damage. The UDV defines itself as nonpartisan, but Carlos sees evidence to the contrary in Brasília, Brazil’s capital, where the UDV’s most influential leaders are.
Carlos Minuano [00:14:51] Esse esse bolsonarismo está cada vez mais explícito, aberto e público.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:14:56] Pro Bolsonaro support is increasingly explicit, open and public. And this alignment with the far right agenda involves going against sexual diversity, environmental protection policies, and defense gun ownership.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:15:10] One of the most prominent Mestres supporting Bolsonaro at the time was Luis Felipe Belmonte.
Carlos Minuano [00:15:16] Advogado, bem-sucedido, dono de construtora, fazenda, tenho clube de futebol,
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:15:22] He’s a successful lawyer, owner of a construction company, a ranch, he owns a soccer club. He was to be the vice president of the party former president Jair Bolsonaro was trying to create.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:15:35] Belmonte helped to lead an effort to start a political party for Bolsonaro, Aliança pelo Brasil or Alliance for Brazil. But the effort failed to get the signatures that are required by law to start a new party. Fast forward to 2022, Bolsonaro, hailed by his supporters as a mythical, legendary type figure, ran for re-election. But he lost to Luís Inacio Lula da Silva, a leftist co-founder of Brazil’s Workers’ Party.
Archival News Clip [00:16:10] Quero começar agradecendo os 58 milhões de brasileiros que votaram em mim.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:16:17] Bolsonaro had repeatedly cast doubt on Brazil’s electoral process, and after he lost the election, his party and his supporters claimed the system was rigged against him. It was unclear whether he would accept defeat. In the weeks after Bolsonaro’s defeat, his supporters mobilized across Brazil to protest the results. Many set up camp outside military headquarters in several cities, chanting things like Armed Forces, save Brazil. They were calling for a military takeover ahead of Lula’s inauguration. One former UDV member told me that in the lead up to the inauguration, people inside the UDV were encouraging members to go to the military headquarters to protest the election and push for military intervention. Photos circulated online of Mestre Monteiro, the 91-year-old UDV leader, smiling at the camera in these demonstrations. In one, he’s standing outside the army barracks in Campo Grande, next to other members of the UDV, many of them draped in the Brazilian flag. In another picture, he’s seen pointing at a banner calling for a quote, federal intervention, which was a euphemism for a coup. Screen grabs of these photos flooded WhatsApp groups of UDV members. Some agreed. Others were horrified. Around the same time, a letter Monteiro wrote and signed by hand also went viral in these groups. He addressed Brazil’s armed forces, calling for military action to stop communism, openly inciting a coup. Here’s Carlos, the journalist again.
Carlos Minuano [00:18:08] Polarização chegou a níveis extremos, né? As coisas também lá na União.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:18:15] Polarization reached extreme levels, and the crisis inside the UDV just kept escalating to the point that they summoned members to take part in protests and eventually even in the attempted coup itself, the attack on the three branches of power on January eighth, twenty twenty three.
Carlos Minuano [00:18:31] Janeiro de dois mil vinte e três, né?
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:18:39] In the capital, Brasília, thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed into Congress, the Supreme Court, and the Presidential Palace just days after Lula’s inauguration. The January eighth riots in Brasilia mirrored the January sixth attack two years earlier when Trump supporters invaded the US Capitol. As UDV members watched the events of the day, they weren’t sure who in their ranks had joined the uprising in Brasilia.
Master Francisco Joffily [00:19:07] Fala pessoal, estamos aqui ao vivo de Brasília. Hoje, dia 8 de janeiro de 2023, os patriotas já tomaram conta aqui do Palácio do Planalto e do Congresso Nacional.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:19:19] Then one of the UDV’s mestres, Francisco Joffily, shared a video of himself during the riots, walking down the Esplanade of Ministries wearing a Brazil jersey like the other rioters. The Patriots have already taken over the presidential palace and Congress, he says. This is a historic day for Brazil. He was streaming it live on social media.
Archival News Clip [00:19:41] Brasília, 8 de janeiro. Vândalos furam o frágil bloqueio que deveria proteger a espanada dos ministérios e partem para a invasão do Congresso Nacional.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:19:52] It was historic. And on September 11th, 2025, Brazil Supreme Court convicted Jair Bolsonaro of plotting a coup to remain in power after losing the 2022 election. A strategy that included a plan to assassinate now President Lula. Bolsonaro was sentenced to more than 27 years in prison. But the January 8 attacks two years earlier sent shockwaves across Brazil, all the more so for those who saw familiar faces.
Alexandre Rodrigues [00:20:23] As pessoas estimulando ir para frente de quartéis, estimulando essa ideia de.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:20:31] Including Alexandre Rodrigues, a lawyer who used to be a member of the UDV. When he saw Mestre Joffily in the riots, he was outraged and decided to take legal action. Two days later, he filed a civil lawsuit in Brazil’s Supreme Court to investigate whether the UDV was using ayahuasca for political indoctrination.
Alexandre Rodrigues [00:20:53] Se o chá era utilizado para lavar cerebral ou algum tipo de estímulo a movimento de extrema-direita,
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:21:00] He says he asked the court to investigate if the brew was being used for brainwashing to fuel a far right movement and to investigate the UDV leaders who incited members to take part in the coup attempt. Alexandre also called for the Supreme Court to temporarily suspend the UDV’s right to use ayahuasca until these matters were clarified.
Alexandre Rodrigues [00:21:21] Então, a forma que eu utilizo foi o que justificou eu ficar incomodado com esse tipo de situação, de ver em pessoas.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:21:30] As someone who takes ayahuasca regularly and believes in its benefits, Alexandre says he doesn’t want to see it used in the wrong way, but the Supreme Court transferred the case to a lower court, which ultimately dismissed it. Alexandre decided not to appeal the decision. He feared the lawsuit could end up posing a risk for other religions that drink the brew in Brazil.
Alexandre Rodrigues [00:21:51] Eu, como usuário da ayahuasca, me veio uma preocupação que eu poderia criar problema para as outras.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:22:00] Lawsuits against the UDV kept coming. Sanderson Moura, a prominent criminal lawyer in the state of Acre in the Amazon region, claimed he was removed from the UDV’s board of masters after posting a picture on the beach in January, reading a book by Osho, the Indian philosopher and spiritual leader. On his social media accounts, Sanderson wrote that he had been removed for being a leftist and said, quote, We’re living through a dark, regressive period marked by Trumpists, Bolsonaroists, fascist, racist, misogynistic, and homophobic persecution within the UDV. Sanderson filed a lawsuit to annul his expulsion, and the court forced the UDV to reinstate him as maestre. The UDV is appealing that decision. He declined my request for an interview. People like Sanderson are fighting to stay on in the UDV. The church community plays a significant role in many followers’ lives. But as things got worse, more and more followers lost their stamina.
Ana Duarte [00:23:08] Ambiente de briga pelas redes sociais.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:23:11] You heard from Ana Duarte at the start of this episode. She had been in the UDV for nearly two decades when the messages from the Mestres started to clash with her progressive politics.
Ana Duarte [00:23:23] Depois o Bolsonaro foi eleito, os que votaram nele ficaram muito arrogantes.
Speaker 2 [00:23:29] After Bolsonaro was elected, those who voted for him became very arrogant. We couldn’t even mention Lula’s name inside the UDV because it became officially extreme right. Officially Bolsonaro. I felt like people had been mentally hijacked.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:23:46] First, Ana didn’t want to lose her church community. She was almost 70 by then. She didn’t want to restart her social life all over again. So Ana stayed. I should note here that Ana is not her real name. She asked us to use a pseudonym for this story for fear of retribution for speaking critically of the UDV. And then, when Bolsonaro ran for re-election, things got worse for her.
Ana Duarte [00:24:11] Bolsonaro perdeu a eleição. Menina foi chororô. E aquela lamentação parecia que tinha acontecido.
Speaker 2 [00:24:21] When Bolsonaro lost, people were devastated. It felt like someone had died. In the first session after his defeat, all the sermons were for those on the far right, supporting masters on the side of Bolsonaro. It was enough. I decided not to come back.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:24:40] Even though Lula had won the election, Ana felt nothing had changed at the UDV. So in early 2023, she decided to leave.
Ana Duarte [00:24:49] É como se ela tivesse sido contaminada por uma doença grave mortal.
Speaker 2 [00:24:54] It’s like the UDV has been infected with a serious deadly disease. There’s no way you can survive like this. For me, it lost its magic. I can no longer see it as something good, pure, or righteous.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:25:09] So, Ana wrote a poem. It’s called Arautus Dado, Heralds of Pain. I asked her to read it to me.
Ana Duarte [00:25:18] Sombra. A sombra. When fogo no eluis.
Speaker 2 [00:25:23] The shadow haunts when fire is not light. To what? To whom the scales lead. Heralds of pain preaching love. Is truth or vanity the antonym of the flower?
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:25:50] The UDV in Brazil declined my request for an interview. They stated that the leaders of the spiritual center have chosen not to speak to the media regarding the topics of this episode. In previous reports about the internal crises sparked by support for Bolsonaro, the UDV said it was nonpartisan, did not profess political ideologies, and had no preference for presidential candidates. In 2023, the UDV told Brazilian newspaper Folha de São Paulo that, quote, “the political preferences expressed by some of its membrs did not represent the UDV as an institution – they were strictly personal opinions.” They were strictly personal opinions. We’ll be right back.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:26:41] While people like Ana were shocked to see members of the UDV promoting right wing ideologies, others weren’t surprised. Queer members of the UDV say they saw this coming for years.
Armando Grisi [00:26:54] Então, Deus fez Adão e Eva, não foi Adão e Ivo. Isso é claramente falado. Foi Adão e Eva, não foi Adão e Ivo.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:27:03] God made Adam and Eve and not Adam and Evo. They say this clearly and in every session a statute read at the beginning defines that marriages within the U D V are between a man and a woman, with the aim of establishing a family.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:27:19] Sixty one year old Armando Grizi had no doubts about his sexuality when he first went to the UDV. It was nearly thirty years ago in the city of Salvador. He was openly gay and had a male partner. He had come across an article about ayahuasca in a magazine. It spoke of transcendence, of revealing another world.
Armando Grisi [00:27:40] Então, naquele momento, eu falei, eu quero isso aqui. Só que eu não sabia como funcionava a estrutura da união do vegetal, a homofobia que existe lá.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:27:47] At that moment I said I want this. But I didn’t know there was homophobia in the U D V. I didn’t know there was a military discipline. And when I drank ayahuasca for the first time it was magic. I had a beautiful experience. It was painful too, because there are the physical reactions to the tea, the vomiting, the discomfort. But I felt I had reconnected spiritually.
Armando Grisi [00:28:12] Encontrado com a espiritualidade.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:28:15] Armando had been in the Brazilian military as a sergeant in the Amazon and was impressed with the UDV. Brazil has other ayahuasca religions like Santo Daimi, but the UDV is known as the most well organized. It’s structured into departments with well defined rules and members engaged in volunteer work and charity.
Armando Grisi [00:28:35] É muito organizado, tudo funciona dentro da melhor qualidade, do tratamento, do cuidado.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:28:40] Everything works is well cared for, the quality, the guidance people are offered. This stood out to me because of my military background.
Armando Grisi [00:28:50] Eu vim de militar.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:28:53] Gradually though, he began to experience discrimination. Things escalated when he decided to visit a different nucleo of the UDV.
Armando Grisi [00:29:02] Todo mundo sabia que eu era gay e falaram para esse mestre, o mestre estava lá dirigindo.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:29:08] People knew that I was gay and told the mestre who was conducting the session. We all got in line to receive our glass of ayahuasca. When it was my turn, he told another mestre, bring me that stronger tea, the one that knocks out mestres. He gave me a full glass, more than double what he was giving others. And as I was under the effect of the brew, he started to hammer home that homosexualism was wrong. Homosexualism was of the negative force. He kept saying bad things about homosexuality, calling it an aberration.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:29:45] This happened to Armando twice with the same mestre at the same núcleo. He says the second time was even worse because the strong dose of ayahuasca made him very sick. When he was vomiting outside, the maestre had people carry him back inside. They sat him in the first row. Armando sank into his seat, feeling sick, and as drool came out of his mouth, the maestre started to preach that homosexuality was wrong, that God disapproved.
Armando Grisi [00:30:21] E porque é a lavagem cerebral, é lavagem cerebral, é uma lavagem cerebral. Porque o chá tem uma fluência muito grande, Kiko.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:30:27] It’s brainwashing. Brainwashing. Because the brew has a very strong influence. You become very sensitive. And what’s being said builds pictures in your head. You have visions. So imagine hearing that homosexuality, or rather, homosexualism, which is how they say it, is a disease, something from the devil. It’s terrifying. People panic and want to leave that path. I saw many people who in theory converted because of this who ended up getting married. And then the others would say they’re cured.
Armando Grisi [00:30:58] Conheço vários gays que casaram-se para poder provar.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:31:03] Armando said the master who held these sessions was Jair Gabriel da Costa, the son of Mestre Gabriel. Today, Jair Gabriel is the UDV’s highest authority. Armando stayed in the UDV for more than a decade after those incidents, until 2018. He’d endured prejudice and homophobia before as part of the military and as a Jesuit missionary. In the UDV, he felt mostly welcomed.
Armando Grisi [00:31:30] As amizades que você faz lá dentro, as pessoas que você conhece lá dentro, nem todo mundo é assim, nem todo.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:31:37] The friendships you make, the people you get to know, not everyone is like that, or things like that. Each nucleo follows the orientation of its mestre representative. Some chapters are a lot more welcoming and open. Others are very rigid, devotional, dogmatic. The one I went to had lots of artists and female counselors who advised mestres to be more flexible. And there is the beauty of the tea and teachings that are good for our lives.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:32:12] Armando was a dedicated community member, but he could never climb the UDV’s ranks. The journalist Carlos Minuano says queer members usually don’t go beyond the beginner rank. Women never make it to maestre.
Carlos Minuano [00:32:26] Esse viés conservador da União Digital é viés conservador de base, né? Assim, que está na própria doutrina.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:32:33] This conservative bias is at the base of the UDV’s doctrine. It preaches traditional gender roles such as women as mothers, wives, housewives. It’s strongly binary in the sense of the spiritual understanding of the world. Right and wrong, men and women.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:32:54] In one of his stories, Carlos uncovered a controversial document read out in ayahuasca ceremonies, saying that homosexualism contradicts the natural origin of human existence and would amount to the extinction of the human species. The author was Luis Felipe Belmonte, the UDV master who owns a soccer team.
Bia Labate [00:33:14] To become a mestre you have to be married and you can only be a man. So the whole system is around that concept. The idea is that the heterosexual cisgender male is the mestre and that’s like the higher path and the higher knowledge.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:33:31] That’s anthropologist Bia Labate again. Gradually, this clashed with Bia’s own sexual identity, even though she had a history with the UDV.
Bia Labate [00:33:41] This has been very painful to witness, particularly as a queer woman that has a wife, and the UDV has in fact a foundational document saying that the only legitimate form of family is a man and a woman. So it’s citing as many other religions with heteronormativity and implying that everything else is pathological and deviation. I really think people underestimate the mental health effects on people like me, on us, of hearing these things. But I personally have a deep debt of gratitude to the UDV because my first glass of ayahuasca I drank over there and it changed my life forever. I dedicated my whole life to studying this topic. And I attended the UDV over 20 years. So I have a part of me that likes and is grateful, and we’ll never forget that.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:34:39] Although other religions also condemn homosexuality, I asked Bia if the use of ayahuasca made things different in the UDV.
Bia Labate [00:34:48] Using psychedelics related to that is extremely cruel because people are very vulnerable and very open. You think about your deeper secrets, you look yourself in the mirror, you connect to this ineffable aspects of reality and just open up yourself in the middle of that experience to have doctrinary content anti-gay is something that I think should be forbidden, actually. It should be completely illegal and it’s against human rights and it’s oppressive. And I personally have suffered sitting in ayahuasca ceremonies in UDV and listening to content like that to a point that I decided that I no longer attend. However, I do feel sad about that because there’s a part that was extremely beautiful and touching and has helped me a lot. So I personally decided to protest and not attend the UDV any longer.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:35:50] Reporting the story, it struck me how hard it was to find current followers of the UDV who would discuss this matter with me. Some feared they’d be reprimanded and even banished. Others worried about betraying an institution that was part of their spiritual and social life, or that helped them deal with drugs and alcohol addiction. Others told me about the beauty of ayahuasca, and that the leaders supporting Bolsonaro were a temporary problem that would go away. Journalist Carlos Minuano.
Carlos Minuano [00:36:21] Tem algumas pessoas que não querem perder esse lugar sagrado, esse lugar que muitas vezes foram.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:36:29] There are some people who don’t want to lose the sacred place, a place that has often been one of transformation and growth. They don’t want to give that up, so they either accept what’s happening or stay silent.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:36:41] Armando Grisi said he spent ten years working hard to move up in the UDV, but he was only allowed into the second tier once he separated from his former husband.
Armando Grisi [00:36:51] Quando eu tava no construtivo, começou o bulburinho na minha cabeça, que eu tinha que arrumar uma namorada, que eu tinha que me casar com uma mulher, que eu tinha que não sei o quê, porque eu sei.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:36:58] Soon, people started telling me I had to find a girlfriend and I should get married to a woman. When I started dating another man, I didn’t tell anyone.
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:37:08] In 2018, when Armando saw UDV leaders starting to back Bolsonaro for president, he chose to walk away. He left the UDV, moved to Portugal, and he decided to speak out.
Armando Grisi [00:37:21] Alguém tem que falar. Como as pessoas que estão lá dentro não falam? Porque se elas falarem, elas são punidas, porque funciona como rejeito.
Voiceover (Andre Lacerda) [00:37:27] Somebody has to talk. People on the inside don’t talk because if they do they will be punished. It’s hypocrisy to speak of love and fraternity, which is what the mestre taught, and in reality be prejudiced and moralistic.
Armando Grisi [00:37:43] Preconceituosa, moralista, cheia de coisa, entendeu?
Julia Dias Carneiro [00:37:48] Bia Labate thinks maybe a new generation will change the UDV.
Bia Labate [00:37:52] I believe the change has to come from within. And I don’t think we have to engage in the demonization of the UDV and a pathologization of the UDV. That doesn’t help that just replicates the same systems of polarization and hate.
Arielle Duhaime-Ross [00:38:21] Altered States is a production of the UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics and PRX. This episode was reported and produced by Julia Dias Carneiro with help from Carlos Minuano and Cassady Rosenblum. Voice acting by Andre Lacerda, Giovanna Romano Sanchez, and Augustin Tefoya. Adizah Eghan is our senior editor. Our executive editor is Malia Wollan. Jennie Cataldo is our senior producer, and our researcher is Cassady Rosenblum. Our associate producer is Jade Abdul Malik, and our audio engineers are Terence Bernardo and Jennie Cataldo. Fact checking by Graham Hacia. Our executive producers are Malia Wollan and Jocelyn Gonzales. And our project manager is Edwin Ochoa. Our theme music is by Thao Nguyen and Nate Brenner. Special thanks to Bob Jesse. And I’m your host, Arielle Duhaime-Ross. Be sure to subscribe, rate, and review Altered States wherever you get your podcasts. And heads up, we’re taking a quick midseason break. We’ll be back with new episodes in two weeks.
Arielle Duhaime-Ross [00:39:21] Most well-known psychedelics remain illegal around the world, including in the United States, where it is a criminal offense to manufacture, possess, dispense, or supply most psychedelics, with few exceptions. Altered States does not recommend or encourage the use of psychedelics or offer instructions in their use.