Good evening, Bishop Rogerio!

My name is Glaucia. We spoke yesterday at the Temple. As you requested, I am sending you my testimony in detail and I would like to thank you for all your help.

I grew up in a home where there were constant arguments because my father was an alcoholic and served evil spirits. I saw and went through many things at home, but didn’t understand they were caused by demons, so I harbored a lot of hate towards my father.

When I was only 13 years old, I started using drugs and being promiscuous with older men. I was introduced to marijuana, cocaine, ecstasy and hard liquor. I hung out with the worst crowd, went to raves and stayed out all night, which caused my parent’s great distress.

At the age of 16, I went to a party in a bad neighborhood with some girls I had just met. While there, I met a boy. I didn’t know he was in charge of the drug cartel in that neighborhood. I became his girlfriend and enjoyed being treated like a queen. Of course, this was only in the beginning.

All the girls in the neighborhood hated me, because they dreamed of being in my place. I didn’t like him that much to subject myself to everything he did, but I liked seeing the agony it was causing my family.

After facing some jealousy issues, I stopped working, but I still had everything – because of the drug trafficking, of course: clothes, shoes, everything a girl wants. Not that I didn’t have these things at home, with my parents, because they also provided an excellent life for me.

I stayed with him for a year and half. During this time, I saw and experienced everything. I saw all the rottenness that exists in this disgusting underworld: children being recruited to traffic drugs, murders, weapons, drug trading, etc. But I was getting tired of that life and missed my freedom.

However he was obsessed with me, he was really infatuated. I couldn’t speak to anyone. On Friday afternoon, he would wait for me in front of the school and if I came out speaking to someone, that would be it… So I distanced myself from my friends because I didn’t want to risk them getting beat up. And whenever I spoke about being unhappy with something in the relationship, I was the one who got hit.

My mother didn’t really know about what I was going through in full detail; she already had such grief with my father, so I tried to spare her.

One weekend, he hosted a party to celebrate the closing of a big deal. I always had to be dressed to the nines so he could put me on display. But that evening, I caught him cheating on me with another girl. I couldn’t stand it. Not because I loved him, but betrayal was something I just couldn’t accept!

Even with so many problems at home, my parents were faithful to each other, so I could not accept what had just happened. In a bout of rage, I threw myself at him and he started hitting me –I got hit by him and his men– in front of everyone.

We went back to his house and he continued. And before doing the most disgusting thing a woman can possibly do, he said: “Now I’m going to show you what you’re good for…” And there, in front of about 15 guys, he raped me. I think that no matter how bad a woman may suffer during a violent act, putting her on display during a sexual act is the sickest thing that can ever happen. And he kept saying that he was going to give me as a present to all those men, so they could do the same with me.

Bishop, that’s when I hit rock bottom. I felt like the most disgusting person on earth, but at the same time, it was as though I was numb. I was drunk, but I could hear his friends laughing and shouting: “Now it’s my turn!” It was very painful. And the truth is that the physical pain was not what hurt the most. However, deep down he still had feelings for me, so he did not allow the others to touch me. They just kept shouting to terrify me. He would say that his woman couldn’t be with any other man.

Bishop, forgive me for writing so many details, I’m not proud of any of them, but being in a relationship with a thug doesn’t guarantee a beautiful lifestyle at all.

The neighborhood was distanced from everyone and everything; they didn’t even have a bus route there, much less at that time of night. I walked for about 50 minutes to get to Presidente Dutra Bus Station and hitch a ride home from there. The first truck that drove by stopped. He was with another man, and I had to sit between them. Another humiliation… I felt like I was being taken as a prostitute.

They stopped at a gas station to buy alcohol, and God sent a police car, which stopped right next to us. I jumped out of the truck. One of the policemen recognized me because he was a friend of the family – there are a lot of retired cops in my family, that’s how he knew me. I told them I was coming from a party and everything was fine. He thought I had been using drugs.

The next day, he came to speak to my family so I could get some sort of treatment. I could have told them about everything that happened to me, I could have pressed charges, but I was extremely afraid. Those who have been involved with this kind of people know there is no going back, only God…

That evening, a relative picked me up but I didn’t tell him what happened either. I went home and my parents were already sleeping. I took 15 showers; I felt so disgusting that I didn’t even want to wear my own clothes. I slept until 7 pm the next day. There was no way to erase what happened, but I tried to move on. Impossible! I was afraid to go to school, to go outside… There was always someone following me and he sent death threats through these people.

A couple of months passed. I occasionally visited the Universal Church. I knew about the Church’s work but it was very difficult to pick myself back up. Though I wasn’t delivered yet, I spoke to God because He had saved me from death before. I didn’t have a pact with Him, but I had already been chosen. I asked God for strength to continue.

He would have people follow me all the way to the Church door. Everything cooperated in favor of me turning away from God.

One day, someone told me that he had been arrested. I felt calmer, but was still a bit scared to go outside. However, his gang was more worried about who would take charge of the cartel next, so I was no longer a problem for them. He didn’t only want to kill me because I was no longer his girlfriend, but because I knew too much about his dirty deeds. This is why I was so afraid.

I had many relapses. The last time was while I was coming from a friend’s house.

I came across an acquaintance one day while I was walking. He did not make a move on me because he was very serious, but the guy with him did. I didn’t pay him any mind – the last thing I wanted since being sexually assaulted was to be in a relationship. But he came walking behind me and greeted me. I just said, “Hi”. But there was something different about him. He asked what was my name, and I answered. We had friends in common, so it was easy for him to find out more about me.

At the time, I was working at my family’s supermarket, and he would come by every day. We started a friendship, and his polite and calm demeanor allowed me to trust him. We started a relationship. He was different, very respectful. He was not from where I lived, he was just there for work. He said that he was a member of the Universal Church, but was a little weak in the faith and wanted someone to go with him. He asked me to be his girlfriend and said he was going to speak to my father. Imagine, I had never seen anything like this!

At the time, I was not talking to my father, and he made me apologize to him. He would say, “I can’t date someone that doesn’t speak to her father.”

That day I realized that he appeared to really change my life. He knew the work of the Church better than I did, so he helped me with a lot of things. He was fundamental in my deliverance, and we began walking in faith together. We climbed up, step by step, together and the same still happens today.

Bishop, I have two theories about the merciful love of God. God used a person, who was in the world but already knew Him, to rescue me. By being so respectful, he helped me get rid of all that disgust I felt towards men. He never tried to do anything inappropriate with me; instead, he respected someone that didn’t even respect herself. Especially because I felt filthy for being so used, so humiliated. Yet God gave me a pure man, just like I became pure after having an encounter with Him.

We have been married for 14 years, have a 12-year-old daughter and do the work of God.

My husband has visited the Adriano Marrey Penitentiary as a pastor and met the man that abused me, because he is still in prison. And while I waited for my husband outside, I jumped on the opportunity to evangelize the young women waiting in line to visit their boyfriends in jail because if it weren’t for God in my life, I could have been one of those girls.

Bishop, forgive me if I went too far, or wrote too many details, but that is what God does, right, lol? I know you are very busy, and there is so much more.

I’ve tried to be as brief as possible, but there is one more thing I thought you should know: I was recently there in the cathedral – I took my daughter to a meeting for pastors’ children and met a girl who was waiting for your meeting. She arrived early, and had some vials in her pocket. I sat beside her and started talking to her. She is going through the same thing I was and she said the following words to me: “There is no way out of a relationship with a thug.” I had to tell her my testimony, and said: “The decision is yours, you decide how you are going to leave here today.”

She asked me where the bathroom was, so I showed her. Can you believe that she opened the vials, threw their content into the toilet and pulled the flush? Then she went back to the meeting. I strongly believe that I planted a seed in her.

Bishop Rogerio, thank you once again!

Please send my regards to Mrs. Ana.

Oh, and here are some pictures of the family God gave me.