Venezuela's leftist leader Maduro makes a play for evangelical voters
Evangelical Christians are often courted by right-wing politicians. But in Venezuela, left-wing President Nicolás Maduro is trying to secure the church's support in the run-up to elections.
BARINAS, Venezuela — Evangelical pastor Wenceslao Méndez operates on a shoestring.
To draw people to his sermons, he pedals around this western Venezuelan city on a bicycle, speaking through a PA system mounted on the handlebars. He holds forth from a one-room shack still under construction.
But over the past year, Méndez's church has received a boost from the Venezuelan government. It provided him with free bags of cement, concrete blocks and cans of yellow paint to spruce up the building. Also on the way
