Healing relationships in society: the struggle for citizenship in Brazil.

Abstract

The article describes the transition to democracy in Brazil and the churches' part in what is generally called democratic consolidation, in and after this transition.

The lock opener term is "cidadania" (citizenship), which is the real participation of citizens in democracy, in which they are conscious of their citizenship and strive to exercise their rights and duties. Today, this participation is being complicated by the agency of continuously strong social and economic disparities, as well as by dint of an ambiguous cultural model that races contrary to the equality of all and a positive notion of law.

During the military regime (1964-85) the Roman Catholic