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[dalton99a]

2. Kick

In a statement, the Universal Church said it had played no role in the torrent of litigation. “Brazil’s Constitution guarantees everyone — including evangelical pastors — the right to seek justice,” the church said. “Whoever feels they have been offended or disrespected can seek reparations before the courts, which get to decide who is right.”

The statement said that the right to freedom of speech in Brazil is “not absolute,” and that satire is not a defense for religious prejudice. “It must be remembered that the assertion by the writer João Paulo Cuenca provoked repudiation among many Christians on social media.”

Taís Gasparian, a lawyer in São Paulo who has defended several people who faced similar bursts of almost-identical, simultaneous lawsuits, said plaintiffs like the Universal Church abuse a legal mechanism that was created in the 1990s to make the justice system accessible and affordable to ordinary people.

The type of action filed against Mr. Cuenca doesn’t require that a plaintiff hire a lawyer, but defendants who don’t show up in person or send a lawyer often lose by default. Universal Church pastors began a similar wave of suits against the journalist Elvira Lobato after she published an article in December 2007 documenting links between the church and companies based in tax havens.

The timing and the striking similarities among the lawsuits filed against Ms. Lobato and Mr. Cuenca make it clear they were copy-paste jobs, Ms. Gasparian said.