More reading

In addition to the two books referred to in my previous post I am reading again the seminal work of Gustavo Gutierrez: A Theology of Liberation. I acquired the book having read a reference to liberation theology in the Church of England's report Faith in the City that was published forty years ago. 

The report and the book had a profound effect on my thinking and action. Since those far off days other theologians have been influential in my evolving ideas of God, Jesus and Christian living.  To name a few: Bonhoeffer, Moltmann, Boff, Borg, Bruegemann, King, Romeo, Meyers, Rohr, Holloway and Cupitt.  More recently I have been exploring anew postmodernism and secular theology.  Caputo's book: What to believe? Twelve brief lessons in radical theology  has set me thinking in new directions.

Above all I am interested  in what it means to follow the way of Jesus, both in theory and in praxis. My reading has included a book by Aaron Stauffer: Listening to the Spirit: The Radical Social Gospel, Sacred Value, and Broad-based Community Organisations. Set in a USA context it nevertheless has much of value applicable in other contexts.

I digress. Returning to Gutierrez.  He places an emphasis on the preferrential option for the poor, the gospel's demand for social justice and the need for liberation to come from within and articulated by poor communities.  It is this latter point that he uses to distinguish liberation theology from progressive theology. Liberation theology is not "the radical, political wing of European progressive theology."

Gutierrez writes of an 'irruption of the poor' by which he means 'the poor turning into active agents of their own destiny and beginning a resolute process that is changing the condition of the poor and oppressed in this world'.  Liberation theology is concerned not only with economic poverty: it is concerned with social poverty, racial and feminist discrimination and sexual discrimination.  

He emphasises the holistic approach. It is not enough to describe poverty and oppression: its causes must be determined.  "Structural analysis has played an important part in building up the picture of the world to which liberation theology addresses itself."  It is important, Gutierrez tells us, that being poor (or oppressed) is a way of thinking, loving, praying, believing, hoping, spending leisure time and struggling for a livelihood". It is about health, environmeent, housing, education, social norms, bigotry and ignorance.

Once the causes of poverty and oppression have been identified there should arise calls from the poor and oppressed for social justice. Our praxis should be solidarity with the poor an oppressed, encouraging them to find a voice.   However such calls, or demands, will be resisted by those who benefit or have an interest in retaining existing structures, a point well argued by JK Galbraith.

The preferrential option for the poor denies exclusiveness.  It is vital to  express God's univeral love for all, as expressed in Jesus, and also his predilection for those on the lower rungs of society. The phrase indicates the first with whom Christians should be in solidarity but that, importantly, we must not lose sight of God's love for all.

I will conclude this very short and inadequte reflection on A Theology of Liberation with a few words from Gutierrez on praxis.

"The praxis on which liberation theology reflects is a praxis of solidarity in the interests of liberation and is inspired by the gospel."