Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world and covers about half the continent of South America.  Brazil's official language is Portuguese and its population is about 176.5 million.  Roman Catholicism came with the Portuguese and still nominally claims 65% of the people.  There is freedom of religion; the cults have taken advantage of this.  Spiritism is very strong in Brazil, which claims to be the largest spiritist country in the world.  The assemblies number almost 800 and there are more than 104 national workers.  The main force is pentecostalism, giving rise to much confusion and many problems.