Reports that a powerful Rio drug lord known for his extremist religious beliefs ordered Catholic churches near his stronghold to close have spooked worshipers and security experts and exposed the advent of a “narco-pentecostal” movement made up of heavily armed evangelical drug traffickers. Claims emerged in the Brazilian press over the weekend that Álvaro Malaquias Santa Rosa – a notorious gang boss known as Peixão (Big Fish) – had determined that three places of worship should shut down in and around the agglomeration of favelas that he controls in northern Rio. Since Peixão – whose nickname comes from the ichthys “Jesus” fish – took power in 2016 of five favelas that have become known as the Complexo de Israel, an allusion to the evangelical belief that the return of Jews to the Holy Land is a step towards the second coming of Christ and Armageddon. A neon Star of David has been erected at the top of the complex and at night can be seen for miles around – an unmissable symbol of Peixão’s force and his faith. The roofs of the favelas’ redbrick houses are dotted with blue and white Israel flags demarcating the territory the gangster controls. When police raided one of his hideouts in 2021 they found a swimming pool framed by a mural of the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem and the words: “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.” In the past, Peixão’s troops have been accused of ransacking Afro-Brazilian temples and banning Afro-Brazilian celebrations in the Complex of Israel, where more than 100,000 people live. But this week’s reports were the first relating to Catholic places of worship. The first inkling that something was amiss came on Saturday when staff at the Our Lady of Conception and Saint Justin Martyr parish told parishioners that meetings and mass were suspended “until further notice”. The social media post was later deleted but, according to local newspapers, word quickly spread among churchgoers that the order had come from Peixão. The broadsheet O Globo said there were subsequent reports that armed men on motorbikes had visited two other local churches, Saint Hedwig and Saint Cecilia, and decreed that weddings or christenings should not take place. Those churches also published messages announcing their temporary closure. The Archdiocese of Rio denied the media reports, insisting their churches were operating as normal. In a statement, Rio’s public security secretary attributed the reports to online rumours and claimed no such order had been given.