The Umbanda comes from a double action: on the one hand, aggregates rites and values that represented candomblé, other African descendant cults and even catholicism. On the other hand, passes over a process of religious re-interpretation under the logic of Kardecist spiritism. If candomblé seeks to reconstitute pieces of Africa in Brazil, Umbanda seeks to, through the middle and lower classes of society, remake a religious Brazil using its syncretic capacity.

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In here, elements of other creeds are absorbed and preserved: Catholic saints, Kardecist traces like the spiritual evolution and spiritual conversation, as well as dances, instruments and rituals similar to the African ways of cult. Thus it is formed the um-banda (one-band), grouping in one many different elements of – and at the same time to – all “bands”.

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This condensation of rituals represents, aside from the search of an authentic Brazilian religion, an attempt to structuring its practices, becoming an institution and demanding a legitimate space in society, besides other religions. It started in the '40s with the creation of federations, aiming better ways of promoting the creed, sponsorship of the religious ceremonies, the regulamentation over the ritual and doctrinal practices and legal support against different ways of persecution.

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Umbanda seeks the spiritual development of the mediums and the entities with whom it treats – old slaves spirits, native Indians spirits, gipsies spirits, etc. For that, one of the main traces of Umbanda is the communication between the supernatural sphere with the material reality, through the incorporation of spiritual entities in an initiated human body, called horses. It is through this communication that those spirits ascend in their evolution process towards perfection, rendering assistance, via the mediums, to those who go to the sessions looking for advice, spiritual purification or any other way of help.

 

“My faith in Umbanda is a road that leads toa great Light, which is the light of the Father. It is charity, it is love. It is believing that people can live better than living on their own, without a religion, and the Umbanda brings everything that is spiritual, everything that is from the Holy Spirit.” - Pai Nenê, director of the Father Joaquim das Almas Umbanda temple.