Catholic priest was Brazil’s most watched streamer in 2025

SÃO PAULO – A priest who became famous for inviting people to pray the rosary at 4 a.m. was Brazil’s most watched streamer in 2025, surpassing gamers and sports commentators.

According to Stream Charts, which collects data from the most popular streaming platforms, Father Gilson Pupo Azevedo, a member of the Carmelite Messengers of the Holy Spirit who is best known in Brazil as Frei (Friar) Gilson, had his videos watched for over 153 million hours last year.

The second most watched streamer in Brazil was Alexandre Gaules Barbosa, who covers Counter-Strike tournaments, with 95 million hours watched. Evangelical Bishop Bruno Leonardo, in third place, had nearly 68 million hours of videos watched in 2025.

Thirty-nine-year-old Gilson is also a singer and leads a ministry called Som do Monte (Sound of the Mountain). His fame has been growing in the South American nation over the past few years, especially through his promotion of the so-called Saint Michael’s Lent, a 40-day devotion that ends on Sept. 29, the archangel’s feast day, and involves fasting and praying the rosary.

In 2024, Gilson attracted 700,000 people to wake up and pray the rosary with him on YouTube at 4 a.m. In 2025, that number exceeded one million.

Unlike other widely known Brazilian priests, Gilson doesn’t look like a TV star. He is always seen wearing his friar’s brown habit and with a shaved head. He also doesn’t try to sound like a generic spiritual guru to please everyone. On the contrary, he is well known for his frank Catholic preaching.

He told Crux that his success is not the result of any marketing strategy.

“On my part, there was never any planning in that regard. I never sat down with a team to define social media growth strategies, nor were there any financial investments aimed at that. We never worried about paying to reach a certain number of people,” Gilson said.

On the contrary, he added he has always believed that he will reach exactly those whom God wants him to reach.

“For this reason, I attribute this entire journey not to any human strategy, because it simply didn’t exist — and to say otherwise would be untrue — but to a simple, genuine, and faithful evangelization. There has always been, however, a constant and daily presence in people’s lives,” Gilson said.

According to Bishop Devair Araújo da Fonseca of the Diocese of Piracicaba, who has been following Gilson’s work for the past few years, a combination of prayer and an invitation to conversion is the key to the friar’s enormous success.

“Gilson and other famous Catholic influencers, like Sister Maria Raquel of the Hesed Institute [Gilson’s frequent collaborator], have a ministry of prayer that reaches people’s hearts. They don’t shy away from talking about sins, errors, and lies, and so they call people to reflect on their lives and change,” da Fonseca told Crux.

The result, the bishop added, is that people seek the path of conversion. During confession, he often hears people say that they examine their conscience after watching one of Gilson’s livestreams.

“People who haven’t been confirmed yet come to us, as well as people in irregular marital situations,” da Fonseca said.

As his fame grew, Gilson was invited to give interviews to some of Brazil’s leading podcasters, reaching diverse audiences. But his message hasn’t changed, said Guto Azevedo, a podcaster and creator of the Catholic podcast Santo Flow.

“He gave me a four-hour interview. For more than 70 percent of that time, he spoke directly about Holy Scripture and the Magisterium,” Azevedo told Crux.

Azevedo believes that Gilson’s experience with music and his innovative approach to evangelization are behind his success.

“He has a very clear evangelization strategy. He teaches what the Church teaches. That’s the main element,” he said.

Analyzing Gilson’s YouTube videos, Azevedo confirmed that most of the video thumbnails are directly related to biblical themes.

Azevedo said that most parishes realized the importance of an online presence during the COVID-19 pandemic, although most of them only livestream Masses and post pictures of events on social media.

“Digital communications must be planned and managed by a parish like any other activity,” he argued.

He also believes there should be more sharing of best practices in Church communications.

“We have to learn from each other,” Azevedo said.

Santo Flow has been rapidly growing. It is the most visited Catholic podcast in Brazil, with 640,000 YouTube subscribers. One of Santo Flow’s strategies is to release up to 15 clips of interviews daily, often with attention-grabbing content.

“Younger generations expect content to reach them through short clips,” Azevedo said.

Gilson’s videos — which are only available on YouTube, where he has 8.7 million subscribers — tend to be long, often over an hour and a half. But he also posts short clips with rapid reflections.

“I think consistency and truth have led many to find in our content a place where they can listen to God, recover inwardly, and nourish their souls,” Gilson told Crux.