Cartographies of Experience: Rethinking the Method of Liberation Theology

Horizons ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 237-261 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristien Justaert
Keyword(s):  
Liberation Theology ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Hierarchical Relation ◽  
The Way

The core of this article consists of a critical rethinking of the classical “see-judge-act” methodology of liberation theology. The article contends that this method threatens to install a dualism between a universal, secular experience of oppression and a Christian interpretation of it, thereby creating a hierarchical relation that reduces the complexity of the experience of poverty. The author investigates this issue by focusing on liberation theology's understanding of the “preferential option for the poor” (part 1) and the way in which the see-judge-act methodology affects this understanding (part 2). The article gradually moves on to alternative epistemologies, starting with a discussion of a hermeneutical approach (C. Boff and Schillebeeckx) and the method of “historicization” (Ellacuría), and eventually proposing a new phenomenologically and materially informed methodology for liberation theology that is called “cartography” and is grounded in a “new materialist” metaphysics as articulated by Deleuze, Braidotti, and Barad (part 3).

Liberation Theology in Latin America

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew A. Shadle
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Historical Reality ◽  
Gustavo Gutierrez ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Political Turmoil ◽  
The Church

This chapter examines the emergence of liberation theology in Latin America. It offers three cases studies illustrating the economic and political turmoil in Latin America in the 1960s and 1970s: Chile, Brazil, and El Salvador. The chapter then turns to the theology of two prominent liberation theologians, Gustavo Gutiérrez and Ignacio Ellacuría. Gutiérrez proposes that God calls us to make a preferential option for the poor, and to work for integral liberation in history. Similarly, Ellacuría explains that God offers his salvation in history, and the church is called to realize the Reign of God in the midst of historical reality, siding with the “crucified people” with whom Jesus identifies.

Prophetic Preaching, Liberation Theology and the Holy Land

2004 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-244
Author(s):  
Duncan Macpherson
Keyword(s):  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
Holy Land ◽  
Prophetic Preaching ◽  
Oppressed People ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Theology Of Liberation

For Christian preachers the Holy Land is essential to understanding the Bible. Preachers often leave modern Israel-Palestine out of their preaching picture. Others, fundamentalist preachers, support modern Israel for its part in an apocalyptic drama of the last times. A third group sees the land as the recompense to the Jewish people for their sufferings – reinforced for some by a residually literalist interpretation of Scripture. Still others show solidarity with indigenous Palestinian Christians, developing a theology of liberation emphasising God's preferential option for the poor – the Palestinians and all oppressed people. Homiletic strategies will be sketched to illustrate this last approach.

Theologies of Liberation

2015 ◽  
pp. 802-819
Author(s):  
Roberto Goizueta
Keyword(s):  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Vatican Ii ◽  
Catholic Action ◽  
Gustavo Gutierrez ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
The Third World ◽  
Early Influences ◽  
Do So

The term ‘theologies of liberation’ refers to a global theological movement that emerged in the 1950s and 1960s among Christians working for justice among the poor of the Third World. Most systematically articulated, initially, by Latin American theologians such as the Peruvian priest Gustavo Gutiérrez, liberation theology is rooted in the Gospel claim that Jesus Christ is identified in a special way with the poor and marginalized of our world. Early influences on the emergence of liberation theology in Latin America included: the Catholic Action movement, base ecclesial communities, Vatican II (especially Gaudium et spes), and the Medellín Conference of 1968. The central insight of liberation theologies is that, because God makes a ‘preferential option for the poor’, we are called to do so as well; if Christ is identified with the marginalized, the lives of the poor is the privileged locus for practising Christian theological reflection.

Ecclesial Opposition to Mining on Mindanao: Neoliberalism Encounters the Church of the Poor in the Land of Promise

2007 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Holden ◽  
Daniel Jacobson
Keyword(s):  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Development Programs ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Philippine Government ◽  
The Church

AbstractIn the developing world, environmental issues are often livelihood issues as the poor try to protect resources necessary for their subsistence. This paper examines the opposition of the Roman Catholic Church, on the Island of Mindanao, to neoliberal policies designed by the Philippine government to encourage nonferrous metals mining by multinational corporations. Mining is an activity with substantial potential for environmental degradation that can deprive the poor of their livelihood. The Church, demonstrating the influence of liberation theology and its preferential option for the poor, has taken a stance opposing mining as an activity that may harm the poor by degrading the environment upon which they depend for their livelihood and further impoverish them. The paper examines the Church's efforts to provide alternative development programs for the poor and discusses the potential for more conflict between neoliberalism, and its "top down" methods of implementing policies, and liberation theology with its "bottom up" perspective on achieving development.

Apocalypticism in Political and Liberation Theology: Toward an Historical Docta Ignorantia

Horizons ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Matthew Ashley
Keyword(s):  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Rhetorical Analysis ◽  
Contemplative Prayer ◽  
Johann Baptist Metz ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Mystical Theology ◽  
Jon Sobrino ◽  
The Way

AbstractThis article examines political and liberation theologies as instances of apocalypticism, focusing in the work of Johann Baptist Metz and Jon Sobrino. The first section develops a heuristic framework for identifying and analyzing apocalyptic discourse in general, using the historical work of Bernard McGinn and the rhetorical analysis of Stephen O'Leary. The second section applies this framework to Metz and Sobrino, arguing that their theology is a legitimate, provocative, and instructive instance of apocalyptic discourse today, in part because of the way it integrates apocalyptic eschatology with Christology. In a final section, the intelligibility proper to this apocalyptic discourse is discussed by arguing a correlation with mystical theology with its discursive pair of cataphasis and apophasis. Just as this pair finds its context of meaning in the practice of contemplative prayer, apocalyptic affirmations and the reserve expressed in the eschatological proviso find their context of meaning in the practice of opting for the poor.

How Authentically Christian is Liberation Theology?

1988 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 264-281 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Tunstead Burtchaell
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Economic Disadvantage ◽  
Socialist State ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Good For ◽  
In Virtue Of ◽  
Dominant Paradigm

This is a friendly critique of the Liberation Theology being elaborated in Latin America. The preferential option for the poor constricts its attention to economic disadvantage, and ascribes virtually all impoverishment to purposeful oppression. The poor are, simply in virtue of their deprivation, said to be so morally exalted that the gospel has for them no call to conversion. Theirs is a salvation without further ado. Yet their salvation turns out to be predominantly, if not exclusively, economic and political. A predilection for the Exodus displaces the death and resurrection ofJesus as the dominant paradigm for liberation. It is maladapted to a Christian vision of liberation, which must aim at communion with the enemy, not mere triumph. By claiming justice as its goal and fulfillment, liberation theology seems to suffer from a loss of Christian nerve. Looking to the socialist state as the sure guarantor of justice, it seems politically naive, and barren of the Christian hope that both exploiter and victim must be transformed into more than just persons (because prepared to return good for evil) well before the society around them has become a fit home even for justice.

Beyond Universality and Particularity: The Problem of the Human Rights Language in Liberation Theology

2013 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-171 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joas Adiprasetya
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Natural Consequence ◽  
Human Right ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Concrete Universal

Abstract This comment demonstrates the changes of attitude among liberation theologians toward human rights language, from avoidance, through critical confrontation, to appropriation. The reluctance appears as a natural consequence of the idea of partiality and preferentiality held by liberationists, which has always been critical of any claim of universality such as human right. The comment also argues that the latest phase of appropriation is made possible after liberationists employ the ecclesial idea of the ‘preferential option for the poor.’ However, the acceptance of human rights language can only be possible if we see the poor as concrete universal and understand the idea of the ‘preferential option for the poor’ as a middle axiom.

scholarly journals Teologi Lokal dalam Konteks Global

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 55
Author(s):  
Johanes Baptista Giyana Banawiratma
Keyword(s):  
Economic System ◽  
Poor People ◽  
Social Injustice ◽  
Way Of Life ◽  
Economic Dependence ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Economic Participation ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
The Way

Today in the globalization process the poor is marginalized. This reflection is based on the Indonesian context of economic dependence and marginalization of the poor and the powerless. The analysis goes to axes of power namely state, market, and community. Market fundamentalism has penetrated into all kinds of powers in such a way that the powerless is excluded from the economic participation. The economic system is taking sides against the need of the poor people. The way of life of the early Christian gives an example how people live in common. The teaching of Jesus stresses very much on the preferential option of thepoor. The idea of the globalization from below and the multitude might be a help to move forward to face the problem of social injustice in all areas and levels.

Divine Action and the Preferential Option for the Poor

2021 ◽  
pp. 111-125
Author(s):  
William J. Abraham
Keyword(s):  
Liberation Theology ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Divine Agency ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Preferential Option

This chapter engages some strains of recent liberation theology and its claims about divine action, most of all God’s “preferential option for the poor.” It contends that any serious treatment of divine agency and action cannot ignore this powerful strain in theology, especially its desire to place divine liberation at the center of God’s actions. These claims can be understood in a variety of ways, and the chapter proposes to answer this problem by looking at how liberation theology conceives God, what it means for God to liberate the oppressed, the central warrants for that claim, and the problems that arise from it. It undertakes this task by looking at Victorio Araya’s God of the Poor.

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