ABSTRACT
Liberation theology,2 defined most simply, is reflection and action that focuses on freeing humanity from oppression. This action and reflection is based on faith, Scripture, tradition, reason and experience. As this book has emphasized throughout, theology is a practice and practice itself is theological. Further, this book is organized around the Wesleyan Quadrilateral of Scripture, tradition, reason and experience. At first glance, these two pieces fit liberation theology well. However, liberation theology is distinctive in at least two ways. First, liberation
theology prioritizes the powerless,3 the marginalized. Liberation theology argues that Christianity should free humanity and it criticizes traditional theologies, which have often been used to oppress human beings. The powerless, who have been ignored by traditional theologies, are at the center of liberation theology. Liberation theology asks how and why we are oppressed or are oppressing others. It aims to free theology itself from its oppressive uses. Second, liberation theology prioritizes action. Reflection without action is not
theology. Each person is expected to put faith into action. As Clodovis and Leonardo Boff wrote ‘Liberation theology is not a theological movement, but theology in movement.’4 Liberation theology contrasts orthodoxy (which produces dogma, right rules) with orthopraxis (which produces praxis, right action). Praxis is practice that has been reflected upon. Reflection and action produce a spiral known as the hermeneutical circle, the method central to liberation theology. These two distinctions lead to four further emphases in liberation theology,
absent from some traditional theologies. First, the fact that theology is praxis also means that every person can be a theologian. Gustavo Gutierrez stated, ‘There is
present in all believers – and more so in every Christian community – a rough outline of a theology.’5 Theologies are developed as people act and reflect in community. No issue or action is decided by one individual, or hierarchically; the issues are worked out collectively. The role of the ‘formal’ theologian, minister, or scholar is to draw together the threads of this reflection, to write ‘academically’, to introduce new audiences to these themes. Second, liberation theology emphasizes the need for a ‘hermeneutic of suspicion’.6
A hermeneutic of suspicion initially accepts nothing as fact: what we understand our situation to be, what academics or our faith traditions state, and so on. Each piece will be set beside the others and they will all be examined together. Third, liberationists argue that theology is not neutral; it always takes a stand. If a
theology claims neutrality, then it supports the status quo. For example, if theologians claimed to be neutral with regard to slavery, this stance would allow slavery to continue, implicitly supporting it. Finally, liberation theology focuses on God’s kingdom, a new heaven and new
earth.7 There will be a new earth, not just a heavenly afterlife. This new earth is to be worked toward now. Liberationists argued that the emphasis on the ‘here and now’ was missing from much traditional Christian theology. A focus on the new heaven rather than the new earth allowed this life to remain oppressive. Liberation theologies emerged first in Brazil among poor Catholic communities in
the 1960s. These communities came to be known as ‘base ecclesial communities’, groups of fifteen to twenty people who met to discuss life and the Bible.8 The excerpt beginning this chapter is one example. Priests and nuns encouraged their expansion; in Brazil alone they grew to several hundred thousand in number. As these communities reflected and acted, the hermeneutical circle and a new theology, called liberation theology, emerged. This theology focused on analyzing and improving the economic and political situations facing the poor communities. Liberation theologies expanded to address issues of gender, race, ethnicity, ecology,
sexuality, and others where people find themselves oppressed, marginalized, powerless to act. The wealthy were prioritized over the poor, but so too white was prioritized, male prioritized, heterosexuality prioritized. And liberation theologies have moved beyond Catholicism into other Christianities and have emerged in other religions including Judaism and Islam. Some of the Latin American communities were and continue to be multi-religious themselves. In Salvador, Brazil, for example, some people practice Christianity and Candomblé or other indigenous or African-derived religions together. Since theology is practice, we9 will be liberation theologians later in this chapter
and work our way through the method of the hermeneutical circle central to liberation theology. We begin with a brief history of liberation theology’s emergence. Then we work through the four steps of the hermeneutical circle, with examples. By the end of this chapter, you should have a sense of how this tradition is situated in history and culture and how you could begin the process of liberation in community.
