This week, as Jews around the world observed the fasting day of Tisha B'av, commemorating the destruction of the First and Second Jewish Temples in ancient Jerusalem, a Brazilian megachurch received planning permission to build a 10,000-seat replica of Solomon's Temple in the city of São Paulo.
As Tom Phillips of The Guardian noted, a Brazilian newspaper, Estado de São Paulo, reported that the church will cost an estimated $200 million and should be completed in four years.
According to a post on the blog of Bishop Edir Macedo, the founder of Brazil's evangelical Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, which is building the replica, the structure will be 180 feet high, making it nearly twice as tall as the Christ the Redeemer statue that towers over Rio de Janeiro. Mr. Macedo also said that stones of the same type used by Solomon had been ordered from Jerusalem to be used in a complex which will also house 36 Bible schools, television and radio studios and a 1,000-space parking lot.
In 1998, Alan Riding reported for The Times that the Brazilian police investigated charges that the Universal Church "pretends to cure people by expelling the Devil from their bodies, using grotesque and humiliating gestures reminiscent of the barbaric sects of the Middle Ages."
The Bishop's blog also reported that a leader of the city's Jews has called the temple project "very interesting" and suggested that the project might help fight anti-Semitism by educating Brazilians about Israel. The blog also said this about the prospects for a similar project in Jerusalem : "For Jews, there is still hope that the Third Temple is constructed so that the Messiah will reign with them. But for that to happen, they will have to expect some natural disaster or governmental changes."
