Chopp, Rebecca S. - The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering
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The Praxis of Suffering by Rebecca S. Chopp

Dr. Rebecca S. Chopp taught at Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta. She currently is
Dean of the Yale University Divinity School. The Praxis of Suffering was published in 1986 by Orbis Books.
This book was prepared for Religion Online by Harry W. and Grace C. Adams.
(ENTIRE BOOK) This book draws upon the contexts and resources of Latin American
liberation theology and German political theology to introduce the new paradigm of liberation
theology as seen in the works of Gustavo Gutierrez, Johann Baptist Metz, Jose Miguez Bonino,
and Jurgen Moltmann who express the rupture and the continuity of the new theology with its
predecessors. The author interprets liberation theology through a decidedly theological lens,
attending to the question of suffering, examining the turn to praxis, and investigating a "new way
of doing" theology.
Preface
Introduction
In a world where there is so much suffering, the author proposes to explore two contemporary
theological responses to suffering, Latin American liberation theology and German political
theology, in an attempt to develop a new paradigm that offers a language about God that
addresses human suffering in practice as well as theory.
Chapter 1: Latin American Liberation Theology

Latin American liberation theology began with an irruption of conscience among Latin American
Christians, both Roman Catholic and protestant, and their theological reflection on a history of
political, social, religious and economic exploitation of the poor. This led to explorations for a
new way of doing theology based on God as liberator of the poor, with the suffering Christ as
model, and the church as the local community where praxis is engaged in liberating individuals
as well as history.
Chapter 2: Political Theology

German political theology arose in the 1960s in reaction to the intense secularization of Western
culture and churches and the inadequate responses of liberalism and neo-orthodoxy to the
ambiguities of pluralism and relativism. It called for a radical transformation of theology and
focused on the reality of the massive suffering in human history by insisting on the interruption
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of this history through solidarity with those who suffer, and by offering the hope for freedom
defined not only in theoretical explanations, but primarily in the praxis of working for liberating
change and transformation.
Chapter 3: Gustavo Gutierrez: A Theology for Historical Amnesia

The paradigm shift in liberation theology places theology itself in a secondary and reflective
position after the struggle of and for the poor, and calls for a liberating praxis that is political and
reflects God's appearance in this struggle. It uses the biblical symbols of the exodus and
eschatological promise as the sources of liberation and saving hope, and sees the church existing
in loving action for others and not for itself.
Chapter 4: Johann Baptist Metz: The Subject of Suffering

Metz illustrates the paradigm shift in liberation theology that calls for an anthropological
revolution challenging the bourgeois ideals of always having more and representing the claims of
those who suffer, while reclaiming the dangerous memory of Jesus Christ not so much as dogma
to be believed but as a praxis to be imitated.
Chapter 5: Jose Miguez Bonino: The Conversion to the World

Latin American liberation theology is a new paradigm of interpretation: theological hermeneutics
names the world in light of the Scriptures but, likewise, hears the Word in light of a liberating
praxis.
Chapter 6: Jurgen Moltmann: The Language of God as the Language

of Suffering
Moltmann's political theology reminds us that the paradigm of liberation theology is a new way
of doing theology, a new way of talking about theology's subject and substance. He also
provokes, in this text, an interpretation of liberation theology as not only a theology in which
human suffering and God are central, but also a theology in which human suffering and God are
related through liberating praxis.
Chapter 7: Christ Liberating Culture

Coming as it does from an emphasis on the massive nature of suffering, liberation theology
demands a new anthropology for interpreting human existence and Christian witness. This
paradigm shift places theology in second place following a praxis that insists upon faith in the
action of Christ liberating culture.
Chapter 8: Toward Praxis: A Method for Liberation Theology

In critiquing modern theology, the liberation theologians developed a new way of "doing
theology" by placing the emphasis on the "doing" or praxis. The undeveloped part of this
methodology will require a more adequate social theory to give full meaning to praxis.
Chapter 9: Conclusion
Liberation theology, in sum, both continues and radically departs from modern theology. As a
continuation, liberation theology represents a radical engagement of Christianity with the world,
with the intent to represent human freedom and God's gratuitous activity in the questions and
issues of the day. As a radically new paradigm and departure from modern theology, liberation
theology reflects and guides a Christianity that is identified with those who suffer and proclaims a
God whose love frees us for justice and faith.
Viewed 1374 times.
The Praxis of Suffering by Rebecca S.

Chopp
Dr. Rebecca S. Chopp taught at Candler School of Theology at Emory University in
Atlanta. She currently is Dean of the Yale University Divinity School. The Praxis of
Suffering was published in 1986 by Orbis Books. This book was prepared for
Religion Online by Harry W. and Grace C. Adams.
Preface
This book draws upon the contexts and resources of Latin American
liberation theology and German political theology to introduce the new
paradigm of liberation theology. Interpretive studies of Gustavo
Gutierrez, Johann Baptist Metz, Jose Miguez Bonino, and Jurgen
Moltmann express the rupture and the continuity of the new theology
with its predecessors. These studies and the two introductory chapters
illustrate the basic themes and fundamental characteristics of liberation
theology. Two constructive chapters conclude the book: one identifies
the systematic claims of liberation theology; one analyzes the
theological method of liberation theology. This book interprets
liberation theology through a decidedly theological lens, attending to
the question of suffering, examining the turn to praxis, and investigating
a "new way of doing" theology.
Many have helped me with this project and I can but thank only a few
in this public space. Special thanks go to David Tracy, Langdon Gilkey,
Martin Marty, Matthew Lamb, and Susan Shapiro. Mary Sturm and
Elizabeth Lynn read different portions of this manuscript with great
care and Ken Langston prepared the index with inestimable fortitude
and attention -- my deep appreciation for their efforts. I also want to
thank Peter Browning and the ministry students at the Divinity School
of the University of Chicago for their blend of theory and praxis and for
their community, questions, and energy. Most of all I must thank my
family -- Mark for his support and his helpful suggestions on the
manuscript, and my son, Nate, for his patience, his playfulness, and his
prayers for the poor and those who suffer.
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Chopp
Introduction
History shudders, pierced by events of massive public suffering.
Memory is haunted, stalked by the ghosts of history's victims,
capriciously severed from life in genocide, holocausts, and
extermination camps. The cries of the hungry, the shrieks of political
prisoners, and the silent voices of the oppressed echo slowly, painfully
through daily existence. Through the wounds, sores, and cracks of
history, the possibility of nuclear war lurks, threatening to annihilate life
itself and thus to prevent even the possibility of suffering.
For most of the world's population in the present and the not-too-distant
past, to live is to suffer: to be born is to become a victim. Once, long
ago, humanity struggled to survive the calamities of nature: floods,
scarcity, plagues, and famines. Now humanity survives to endure its
own disasters, to suffer from its own incessant desire to destroy.
Matthew Lamb describes the world in which we live:
The last eight decades have profoundly changed the understanding of
"an anguished world." Increasingly, the anguish in the world has been
shifted from the weary shoulders of mother nature to the proud
shoulders of a male-dominated history so aptly described by Atlas.
Anguish has taken an anthropocentric (indeed, androcentric) turn to the
subject. The countless wars and the nuclear arms race are only more
evident symptoms of this turn. Never before in human history have so
many humans slaughtered their fellow human beings on such a massive
scale. The Lisbon earthquake pales in comparison with Hiroshima and
Nagasaki. Famines and plagues can hardly measure up to the demonic
intensity of the holocaust. The terrors of nature have tended to take a

back seat to the horrors of history.1
Until recently it was assumed that advances in technology, increases in
knowledge, and growth in material production were proof that the
human race was speeding along on a trajectory toward moral, social,
cultural, and physical perfection. But as the calamities of nature once
rattled the tower of divine omnipotence, so the disasters of history now
explode the freeways of progress. Science and technology pollute and
destroy the air, the land, the water, while our capacities to produce and
consume divide the world into those who have and those who have not.
The labors of freedom have produced the chains of oppression: the
resources of emancipation for the few are the sources of the
dehumanization of the many. Progress is exposed as modernity's plastic
mask, an illusion of our origin and destiny. This progress is history's
suffering; we are its origin, its destiny, its cause.
Concern for suffering is not new, either in social history or in the
tradition of Christianity. Society has worried over its catastrophes, the
acts of God as well as its isolated tyrants and mad persons. Bearing
suffering in its central symbol of the cross, Christianity has always
honored the prophet who alleviates suffering and elevated martyrs who
suffer for their faith. But the events of massive public suffering in
modernity do not settle in among previous concerns, concepts, and
responses. Due to the sheer numbers of victims, the increased awareness
of their plight, and the widespread belief that this suffering could be
otherwise, these events erupt within history with shattering intensity.
This suffering has what we shall call in this book a "nonidentity
character," an inability to be fully expressed in theory or fully
represented in symbols. Events of massive public suffering have no
identity or completed meaning in history; they cannot be fully
explained, understood, or represented. The nonidentity character of
suffering means that suffering cannot be forgotten or ignored in history's
interpretation or construction; once progress has shoved the masses of
humanity onto life's margins, history is broken, its end forever in
question, and its purpose lost in suspension.
Events of massive, public suffering defy quantitative analysis. How can
one really understand statistics citing the death of six million Jews or
graphs of third-world starvation? Do numbers really reveal the agony,
the interruption, the questions that these victims put to the meaning and
nature of our individual lives and life as a whole? Knowledge of
suffering cannot be conveyed in pure facts and figures, reportings that

objectify the suffering of countless persons. The horror of suffering is
not only its immensity but the faces of the anonymous victims who have
little voice, let alone rights, in history. Oppressed, impoverished, and
marginalized, the victims of history speak through narratives, stories,
and poems evoking their human passions, hopes, failures, sufferings. In
their stories, the victims of modern history are revealed as survivors,
for, in the words of Terrence Des Pres, modern history "has created the
survivor as a moral type."2 The survivor offers the testimony of
suffering and yet of surviving, not only for oneself but for others, the
others who suffered and did not survive.
THE WITNESS OF THEOLOGY
In contemporary theology the responses to such suffering -- to its past,
its present, and its future -- appear in liberation theologies. Liberation
theologies interpret the logos of the Theos, that is, speech and
knowledge of God, within the interruption of those who suffer. In a
variety of forms, liberation theology speaks with those who, through
their suffering, call into question the meaning and truth of human
history. Latin American Christians break out of the history of
colonialization and development to rewrite and remake history. Feminist
Christians criticize the male dominance of ecclesiastical structures and
theological systems. Black Christians challenge the white pictures of
Jesus and the segregation of Christian fellowship. German political
theologians negate the bourgeois gospel of apathy and consumerism.
These critiques introduce a religious quest for freedom and justice in
history that recalls the exodus -- the journey for freedom of an
oppressed people. These interruptions open a new voice in history "to
preach good news to the poor/ . . . to proclaim release to the
captives/and recovering of sight to the blind,/to set at liberty those who
are oppressed,/to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord" (Lk. 4:18).
In the Christian church the theoretical implications of justice and
righteousness have long been the special domain of social ethics. The
academy contemplates social ethics by combining theological
interpretations with philosophical principles such as equality, duty, and
fairness. Beyond the academy the church enacts its social principles
through individual actions and institutional structures. The victims of
history are served by various church groups, ranging from small
outreach committees to large charitable agencies. But liberation
theology is not the simple identification of Christian theology with the
region of social ethics, prophetic declarations, or charitable service.

Bringing suffering into the midst of reflection, liberation theology
rethinks human existence, Christian tradition, and present Christian
experience. What can theology say to the problems of human suffering?
Who is the human subject created by God and destroyed by humanity?
Who is God and where is God when history is marked more by
suffering than by caretaking? Is the Bible an occasion for existential
encounter or a witness of memory and hope?
Such questions acknowledge the nature of liberation theology, that the
knowledge of God is today discerned in the midst of suffering. To
understand liberation theology, we must grasp one basic claim:
suffering and its quest for freedom is the fundamental reality of human
experience as well as the location of God, Christ, and the church in
history. Liberation theology urges action, strategy, and change in human
existence; it demands justice, equality, and freedom in Christian
witness. Consequently liberation theology is a new language of God,
seeking, in the present historical situation, to be the voice of those who
suffer.3
As a new language of God, liberation theology is formulated in
opposition to modern, progressive theology. Modern theology, in
attempting to be a language of God in its historical situation, found its
focal center in a quest for the authenticity of the subject. A similar quest
arose in philosophy with the "turn to the subject," in politics with the
emergence of individual rights, and in economics with the development
of private property. But each age gives way to the next, and theology in
its continual incarnation becomes reformed and transformed into a new
encounter of tradition, reflection, and experience. In liberation theology
the bourgeois individual is no longer the primary subject, and
authenticity and meaning no longer the central crisis for theology. Now
the focus of theology is the nonsubjects of history, those who have been
denied any voice or identity in history by their fellow humans. Through
this focus Christianity converts, becoming a praxis of solidarity with
those who suffer and working for the transformation of human agency
and social structures. Through this focal center the sacrament of God's
grace makes visible the identification of suffering and hope, while the
service of God's love opens faith toward a future.
This book argues that liberation theology is a new model of theology
both in its systematic content and in its practical method. The systematic
content of liberation theology relates Christian symbols and narratives
to the focal center of the liberating activity of God. With God's

liberating activity at its center, liberation theology offers a new
understanding of human existence through the centrality of praxis and a
new interpretation of Christianity through Christ's solidarity with those
who suffer. The method of liberation theology demands that theology be
a reflection on Christian praxis -- a reflection aimed at interpretation,
critique, and transformation. As a reflection on Christian praxis,
liberation theology is a practical method, oriented to a specific praxis
and situated within a particular context.
In formal categories this book argues that liberation theology represents
a paradigm shift in theology.4 A theological paradigm is the broad
framework for interpretation; a paradigm shift involves a radical
reorganization of theology, introducing new categories, new issues, and
new metaphors. As a paradigm shift, liberation theology orders issues of
justice and freedom as central to the Christian faith; it introduces social
and political categories for theological interpretation. This new
paradigm centers on the metaphor of liberation, a metaphor referring
both to God's acts in history and humanity's nature and purpose in
history. Within this broad paradigm, liberation theologians ask such
questions as the following: What is the witness of the liberating gospel?
How do Christians encounter God in those who suffer? What is the
vision of freedom disclosed in the Christian Scriptures? How are
suffering and hope identified in Christ?
DIFFERENT VOICES IN THE PARADIGM
This book concentrates on Latin American liberation theology and
German political theology as two distinct voices within the paradigm of
liberation theology.5 The voice of Latin American liberation theology is
the voice of the "other," the voice of those systematically oppressed
within history. The voice of political theology is the voice of the
bourgeoisie, questioning their own basic assumptions and seeking grace
and hope in conversion. In the context of the history of suffering,
German political theologians and Latin American liberation theologians
follow different routes to talk of God.6 Latin American liberation
theology works with the church in actual situations of oppression
responding to the specific needs and issues of the people. German
political theology formulates a theoretical critique of modernity's
understanding of freedom, the human subject, history, and God.
Economic, cultural, and political dependency expressed through theories
of development are criticized in Latin American liberation theology
from the perspective of the poor, who have a privileged option to hear
and speak of God. In solidarity with all who suffer, both the living and
the dead, German political theology criticizes existentialism and
existentialist theology for blindly accepting the fatalism of modernity's
progress toward destruction. Latin American liberation theology draws
upon the resources of Paulo Freire, Marxism, and modern theology to
demand that theology be grounded in a concrete praxis of commitment
to social justice. German political theology converses with modern
theology, the Frankfurt School of critical theory, and its own cultural
situation to mediate theology through practical reason in the categories
of memory, narrative, and solidarity.
But in light of these major differences of context and sources, Latin
American liberation and German political theologians agree not only on
the major fact of contemporary life -- events of massive, public
suffering -- but also on the need for new ways of understanding human
existence, Christianity, and theology.7 Indeed, it is precisely through
their differences that Latin American liberation theology and German
political theology provide a new theological paradigm. In order to
understand the paradigm, each form of theology must be studied in its
own context, with explicit attention paid to the particular voice of each
theology. The testimony of each theological voice must be carefully
recorded, for together they create, as Alfredo Fierro has said, "a new
theological space," or as we shall argue in this text, a new paradigm of
theology.8
This volume provides a framework for understanding the context, the
substance, and the method of liberation theology. The framework
begins, in chapters 1 and 2, by locating Latin American liberation
theology and German political theology in their respective historical,
theological, and ecclesiastical situations. Though German political
theology inherits modern theology's distinct agenda of representing the
freedom of the human subject, it radically challenges the form of this
agenda through its solidarity with those who suffer. Emerging out of a
history of colonization marked by oppression and domination, Latin
American liberation theology engages the church in solidarity with the
poor.
A study of four representative theologians constitutes the next part of
the framework in chapters 3 through 6: this part provides an analysis of
major figures in this theological paradigm and a consideration of central
themes within liberation theology. Four theologians are analyzed:
Gustavo Gutierrez, a Roman Catholic theologian from Peru; Johann

Baptist Metz, a Roman Catholic theologian from the Federal Republic
of Germany (West Germany); Jose Miguez Bonino, a United Methodist
theologian from Argentina; and Jurgen Moltmann, a Reformed
theologian from West Germany. Gustavo Gutierrez interprets theology
and Christianity through his reflection on the irruption of the poor in
history and their new way of Christianity. Johann Baptist Metz
intensifies the basic themes of Christian faith -- the human subject,
freedom, the meaningfulness of history -- to the point of a complete
reformulation of anthropology and Christianity. Gutierrez and Metz
present the basic case for a paradigm shift of theology: they show the
need for a new way of action and reflection; they provide a new subject
and a new form of Christianity; they argue for a new method of and
purpose for theological reflection. Miguez Bonino and Moltmann, on
the other hand, function more specifically to call our attention to
methodological and substantive issues within liberation theology. Jose
Miguez Bonino concentrates on the important issue of the sociohistorical mediation of all theology in developing a liberating
hermeneutics of the Word and the world. Jurgen Moltmann forces us to
recall the narratives of God in hope and suffering, narratives that
demand the rupture of Moltmann's own theological method.
Finally, the framework for liberation theology is finished by the
construction of two models: "Christ Liberating Culture" and "Toward
Praxis: A Method for Liberation Theology." The first model of Christ
liberating culture, the subject matter of chapter 7, considers the
fundamental claims of liberation theology to relocate human existence
in praxis and to reinterpret Christianity as a praxis of solidarity with
those who suffer. In this substantive interpretation of liberation
theology, Christianity follows a model of Christ liberating culture. In
chapter 8, the second model, a model of critical praxis correlation,
investigates the methodological claims of liberation theology. Through
the identification of six theses, this formal model sketches the new
nature and process of theological reflection through the use of practical
hermeneutics, ideology critique, and social theory.
By building this framework of context, representatives, and interpretive
models, this book contributes to the paradigm of liberation theology. It
introduces the themes, issues, and categories of this new paradigm and it
critically interprets the claims, arguments, and symbols within liberation
theology. This book is written with an openness toward the turn to
practical reflection in disciplines other than liberation theology: the turn
to praxis and the concern for suffering mark much of the theoretical and
practical activity of our present world. This suggests that liberation is
itself a situated theology: a response to the needs of the day and an
expression of the general ethos of the contemporary situation. But
through this interpretation of liberation theology and in this broadening
of its location, it is hoped that those who suffer will speak: for any
interpretation of liberation theology must be radically ruptured by the
claims and the cries of those who suffer. Any reflection on God -- the
God who creates, redeems, and liberates history -- must today be
interrupted by God who freely chooses to be with the victims of history.
NOTES
1. Matthew Lamb, Solidarity with Victims: Toward a Theology of Social
Transformation (New York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1982), p. 3.
2. Terrence Des Pres, The Survivor: An Anatomy of Life in the Death
Camps (London: Oxford University Press, 1976), p. 49.
3. Like all theology, liberation theology is a situated theology,
formulating its center and focus through its participation in history. As
Paul Tillich observed, Christian theology finds its material norm
through its own participation in a particular period, see Paul Tillich,
Systematic Theology, 3 vols. (Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press,
1951), 1:47-52. To address the issues of the day is the purpose of
theology; to dialogue with current forms of reflection is the nature of
theology. Christologically this means that theology is an ongoing
interpretation of Christianity; logically this necessitates that the criteria
and norms for theology are, in part, constituted through human
experience.
4. I am employing the language of "paradigm" and "paradigm shift" in
its popular usage to identify a shift in basic assumptions, categories, and
the ordering of issues in frameworks of interpretation. The notion of
paradigm shifts became popular with the widely read work of Thomas
Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 2nd ed. enl. (Chicago,
Ill.: University of Chicago Press, 1970). For a good introduction to the
discussion of paradigms and paradigm shifts, see Richard J. Bernstein,
Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics and Praxis

(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983). For a discussion
on the notion of paradigms in theology, see Sallie McFague,
Metaphorical Theology: Models of God in Religious Language
(Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press, 1982).
5 .For an excellent introduction to the differences between Latin
American liberation theology and German political theology, see
Francis Fiorenza, "Liberation Theology and Political Theology," in
Liberation, Revolution and Freedom. Theological Perspectives, ed.
Thomas F. McFadden (New York: Seabury Press, 1975), pp. 3-29.
6. Latin American liberation theologians are very critical of German
political
theologians for being content to reflect only theoretically on praxis. See
Gustavo
Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics and Salvation, ed.
and trans.
Sister Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books,
1973), pp. 220- 25; Hugo Assmann, Theology for a Nomad Church,
trans. Paul Burns (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1976), p. 92; and Jose
Comblin, The Church and the National Security State (Maryknoll, N.Y.:
Orbis Books, 1979), p. 39.
7. For one critical review of liberation theology that emphasizes the
similarities in sources and common project, see Jurgen Moltmann, "An
Open Letter to Jose Miguez Bonino," in Mission Trends No. 4:
Liberation Theologies in North America and Europe, ed. Gerald
Anderson and Thomas R. Stransky (New York: Paulist Press; Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1979), pp. 59-69.
8. Alfredo Fierro, The Militant Gospel: A Critical Introduction to
Political Theologies, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books,
1977), p. 18.
16

Chopp
Chapter 1: Latin American Liberation

Theology
There is no central founding event for Latin American liberation
theology. The faces of the poor, the midnight roundups of political
prisoners, the gradual genocide of Indian races, and the constant fear of
the masses are all points of origin for this theology that speaks of God
and the poor as always together. If we are to understand this theology,
then we must understand where it begins -- with the poor, in a history of
domination, oppression, and colonialism. But it is not enough to
understand the history of the poor; rather, we must, with this theology,
wager that it is with the poor that God is found in Latin America. "The
theology of liberation," writes theologian Ignacio Castuera, "reveals to
us that theology is done by the pueblo oprimido, the oppressed people,
those who are at the same time the senor de la historia, the Lord of
history."1 It is a wager that we must travel along history in the journey
of the poor -- a journey of faith, which will lead to greater
understanding that is at the same time a transformation.
Having taken this wager that God is with the poor, we can begin to
travel along with the Latin American liberation theologians. Segundo
Galilea identifies the three assumptions of Latin American liberation
theology: "(1) the present situation is one in which the vast majority of
Latin Americans live in a state of underdevelopment and unjust
dependence; (2) viewed in Christian terms, this is a 'sinful situation'; (3)
hence it is the duty of Christians in conscience, and of the church in its
pastoral activity, to commit themselves to efforts to overcome this
situation."2 These assumptions force our theology to be concrete and

social, and require us to investigate the conditions of poverty,
dependence, and injustice. We must, in this sinful situation where we
are committed to transformation, take the tradition of past theology and
find new ways of understanding Christian symbols such as sin,
redemption, and grace. With these assumptions, we must enlarge our
conversation partners and consider issues that may seem oddly
nontheological to those who are new to the journey of the poor. Yet in
dialogue with Marxists or in working with the liberating educational
methods of Paulo Freire we find a new experience of Christian witness
and new ways of speaking of God.
Located within the church, which is one of the few sources of resistance
and creative transformation in society, Latin American liberation
theology is best understood as faith seeking understanding among the
poor of Latin America. It is a church theology in its intentional focus on
issues such as ecclesiology, pastoral practice, and the relation of church
and world as well as in its clear intent to be located within basic
Christian communities. This logos of the Theos is a new way of doing
theology both because it interprets anew human existence and Christian
tradition and because it understands the purpose of theology to be that
of reflecting on and guiding Christian praxis. But most important of all,
Latin American liberation theology is, in its own wager, a response to a
God who is with the poor and whose presence is made visible by the
witness and service of the church.
THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT
The people of Latin America are hungry. Two-thirds of the population
is "undernourished" to the point of starvation; in some areas of the
continent, people chew cocoa leaves and eat mud to dull the hunger
pains. Children in the rural areas survive on clay when the scanty
supplies of rice and beans are depleted; children in the cities scavenge
through garbage on the streets. Five percent of the population holds 80
percent of the wealth. The masses of Latin America are landless. Twothirds of the usable land is in the hands of a few Latin Americans and
foreign multinational corporations. The corporations that own the land
reap the profits from the land.3
The people of Latin America are poor. High rates of unemployment are
due to the ownership of the land by multinational corporations and to
the unstable political situations. Those who are fortunate enough to
work do so for almost nothing. According to Arthur McGovern,

"Brazilian sugar cane workers make about two dollars a day. Near
Recife in Brazil a father picks corn and cotton for rich landowners to
support his family on 65 cents a day. In Caracas, Venezuela, slum
dwellers spend six hours a day commuting to work."4 The people from
Latin America are deprived of education and medical attention. Onehalf of the people suffer from disease; in some countries, as many as
three-fourths of the people are illiterate. Latin America lives in a
constant state of war and siege. Governments use torture, mass media,
and the suspension of basic rights to stifle movements of dissent or
reform.
This is the concrete situation with which Latin American liberation
theology begins its theological reflection. But this concrete situation
exists in a history of continued dominance and repression; the history of
the people of Latin America is a history of the "other," a history of the
"underside." Latin American liberation theology attempts to speak for a
people whose lives have been determined by a centuries-old system of
structural oppression, a system that has used Christianity time and time
again to secure the dominance of the few over the masses. In recalling
this history, Latin American liberation theology finds the resources to
criticize the origin, the function, and the nature of the oppression of the
poor. It finds, as well, symbols, stories, and memories that reveal a new
identity and vision of the human subject in history.
Christianity came to Latin America as part of the Spanish mission to
conquer the New World for the honor of Spain and the glory of God.
The first period of Latin American history is marked by the Spanish
colonization of the sixteenth century. Spain's "temporal messianism"
combined the conquest of foreign lands with the religious project of
converting heathens and pagans. Indeed, before the first explorer ever
set foot on American soil the early destiny of Latin America was settled
through the promulgation of the patronage system by the Holy See,
which established the fundamental principle of conquest and
Christianization.5 Through the patronage system, the church was
responsible to the Spanish crown, and the crown had the power to
appoint bishops, replace clerics, and seize part of the tithes collected by
the church as reimbursement for the heavy costs of the "Christian"
conquest. When the conquistadors arrived in Latin America, they
brought with them the semi-feudal social structures of Spain -- a country
where, as Miguez Bonino observes, "obedience to the great king of
Spain and submission to the King of Heaven were demanded as one
single act."6
The Spanish system of "conquering" territories consisted of subduing
local residents, establishing towns on the model of Spain's cities, and
allocating Indians (nonpersons) as serfs to the conquerors. Spain
established its fiefdom by virtually destroying Indian civilization,
including the impressive Inca, Aztec, and Mayan cultures.7 The Cortez
conquest exemplifies the destructiveness of Spanish conquistador
practices. In 1519 Cortez set out to conquer Mexico -- a land rumored to
be overflowing with jewels and gold.8 Natives were bewildered and
terrified when the conquistador landed with armor, guns, and horses.
Montezuma II, the Aztec emperor, sent Cortez gifts but also demanded
the invader and his men return to their boats and leave immediately.
Cortez responded by burning his boats, establishing the city of
Veracruz, and marching his men to Tenochtitlan, the center of the Aztec
empire. Cortez seized Montezuma and demanded gold, silver, and
jewels. After several battles in which the Aztecs were nearly victorious,
the Spanish warrior succeeded in leveling Tenochtitlan to the ground
and forcing the new Indian slaves to build a city in the Spanish
rectangular form. Cortez rewarded his men with gifts of repartimientos -groups of Indians as pay for the officer's services. As with Cortez in
Mexico, so with Pizarro in Peru, and with Valdivia in Chile: thus Spain
subdued the New World.
The Spanish conquistadors, seeking honor for their king, were
accompanied by missionaries, seeking to glorify their God. Under the
patronage system, missionaries worked for the mass conversion of the
Indians to Christianity and their acculturation to the Spanish worldview.
Through this ostensibly Christian act of service, the church functioned
to establish and secure class stratification and land ownership. Spanish
Christendom's "natural order" established a hierarchy with God at the
top, the king next, then the landowner, and finally the serf. But while
attending to the formal establishment of God's intended order, on the
level of daily religious practices Christianity settled in and around the
indigenous religions.9 The new Latin American Christianity, though
formally following the pattern of Spanish Christianity, often included
Indian beliefs in its liturgies and transformed Christian rituals to fit local
religious practices.
Yet the relationship of church and state was not confined solely to the
church's function as a dominant acculturating and controlling branch of
the state. Gutierrez contends that throughout the history of Latin
America "the religious motivation not only justified but also judged, the
colonial enterprise"10 Notable individuals criticized the domination and
the abuse of the Indians. Bartolome de las Casas was a wealthy holder
of encomiendas, plantations given by the king to Spanish lords as land
grants, plantations on which the Indian serfs were worked and
converted. Las Casas gave up the extravagant way of life on his
encomiendas at the age of forty to work for the Indians, and he traveled
to Spain to present the case of the Indians to the king.11 Las Casas,
understanding the crucial link between liberation and salvation, argued
that the Indians were free human beings and that conquest was not a
means of conversion. Others attempted to provide alternatives to the
destructive encomienda system. The Jesuits, for instance, were
especially active in Paraguay working with the Gurani Indians in
mission houses known as reducciones, where the Indians received
instruction in the manual arts and instruction in Christianity.
But these attempts did not stem the prevailing tide of conquest and
Christianization. For many of the peoples of Latin America, Spanish
colonization resulted in the domination, the oppression, and even the
destruction of their own cultures. Indigenous societies, now termed
"pagan" and "uncivilized," were governed by a "Higher Authority" and
the people themselves, in their own land, became the dominated, the
dispossessed, the despised, the "other." By and large, the first period of
Latin American history consisted of the establishment of a patronage
system granting to the Spanish conquerors the blessing, the right, and
the responsibility to Christianize and colonize the existing cultures of
Latin America.
The second major period of Latin American history began in the
nineteenth century and contains both the independence movements and
the beginnings of British neocolonialism and capitalistic imperialism.
Until about 1808 the Spanish crown was able to contain dissent among
the criollo minority (American-born Spanish) against the ruling
peninsulares (Spanish natives). After 1808 revolutionary movements
sprang up in many different areas of the colonized continent. Criollos
agitated for more liberty, demanding greater freedom of thought, more
political emancipation, and increased economic opportunities under the
peninsulares. These revolutionary movements were heavily influenced
by the North American revolution of the United States, by Napoleon's
capture of Spain, and by eighteenth-century Enlightenment thought.
Many of the revolutionary leaders were educated in Europe or the
United States, where they studied the works of Rousseau, Hobbes,
Locke, and Spinoza. By 1810 criollo juntas had taken over many of the
cities in the course of resisting the French usurpation of the Spanish
throne. This temporary exercise in self-government both increased the
drive and aided the public training for independence; as the historian
Pendle observes, "what had begun as resistance to France developed
into war against Spain."12 Independence also found sanction as a
movement for the rights of the Indians and for the mestizos (persons of
mixed heritage).
By 1830 the established nation-states of Latin America began to
develop trade and communication with other non-Latin American nationstates. As the supplier of aid and personnel to the revolutionary
movements, Great Britain was a natural ally. This relationship between
the nation-states of Latin America and Great Britain resulted in a
"neocolonial" pact: the New World supplied the raw resources and the
industrial country supplied the manufactured goods. The rapid
industrialization of Great Britain at that time meant new goods, gold,
and technology to develop the resources of Latin America. The building
of railroads allowed resources to be brought from the rich inlands of
Latin America to the coasts, from there to be exported by ships.
Railroads also made possible the settling of the inland with cattle
ranches and farms. Capitalist imperialism demanded that the resources
and profits from Latin America become an integral part of Britain's
economy; thus Latin America became more dependent as economic
expansion moved from the sporadic state of colonialism to the regular,
systematic control of neocolonialism.13
The church, identified institutionally and ideologically with the Spanish
crown, suffered a great deal of disorganization and disruption during
this period. Much of the European philosophy popular in this period was
anticlerical and critical of the church for its wealth and power.14 As a
result of the independence movements, the patronage system was
overthrown in many countries. The initial reaction from the Vatican was
the swift condemnation of revolutionary movements, as expressed in the
encyclicals Etsi Longissimo (1816) and Etsi Jam Diu (1824). In some
countries the church simply transferred its loyalty to the new ruling
power; in other countries the church attempted to forge its primary ties
to Rome. In general the church lost many of its previous economic and
political advantages.
Yet even in the midst of its own turmoil, the church often criticized
ruling juntas. Occasionally the church aligned itself with revolutionary
movements, even though it realized that independence would result in

the diminishment of its own power. Many priests not only supported the
revolutions but also called for ecclesiastical reforms such as a revival of
Scripture reading, Mass in the vernacular, the establishment of a "poor"
church, greater freedom of conscience, and a reform or abolition of the
Roman Curia.15 After a time of being pressured both by his own loyalty
to Spain and by the new Latin American countries, Pope Gregory XVI
issued Sollicitudo Ecclesiarum recognizing the new American republics.
This second period also marks the entrance of Protestantism into Latin
America -- a tradition often described as the religion of the investors
and developers and as the religion of democracy, progressivism,
science, and culture. With its emphasis on individualism and freedom,
the Protestant conversion process complemented the reigning ethos of
individualism and freedom in the enlightened world. Just as Catholicism
had functioned as an ideological justification for colonization in the first
period, so Protestantism performed the same service for the
neocolonialism of the second period. Protestant missionaries, after their
arrival in the early years of the twentieth century, often supported
democratic ideology as the truly "Christian way" or, alternatively,
argued that religion had nothing to do with business and politics. Yet
Protestantism, like Roman Catholicism, was not to be identified only
with the reigning powers. As early as the Panama Conference on
Christian Work in Latin America (1916), missionaries talked about the
relevance of the social gospel in Latin America. Protestantism exhibited
the tension of both supporting and criticizing the ruling powers and
ideologies -- a tension it shared with the history of Roman Catholicism
in Latin America.
The third period is marked by a shift in Latin American neocolonialism,
from a dependence on Great Britain to a dependence on the United
States. From the beginning of the independence movements, the United
States indicated special interest in Latin America, expressed in the
Monroe Doctrine of 1823 stating that European involvement in the
independent countries of the Western hemisphere would be considered a
"manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States."16
After 1890 the United States began to take an increasingly important
role in the political and economic affairs of Latin American countries.
In 1895 it invoked the Monroe Doctrine against Great Britain in
Britain's attempt to expand Guinea into Venezuela. Three years later the
United States went to war with Spain over Cuba. Along with these
military interventions, the United States secured its involvement in
Latin America through economic investments in sugar plantations, the

construction of railroads, and the importation of United States
manufactured goods. The 1903 revolution in Panama provided the
United States with an opportunity to construct successfully a canal and
thus to realize a plan for increased military efficiency and economic
opportunity. In 1904 the Roosevelt corollary to the Monroe Doctrine
gave the United States the right to intervene in cases of wrongdoing or
civil disorder in the nation-states of the Western hemisphere. The
corollary provided the rationale for later United States intervention in
the Dominican Republic (1916-24), Haiti (1915-34), and Nicaragua
(1912-33).
During this period the church attempted to develop some significant
new political positions. The New Christendom movement, one such
development, represented a progressive, if moderate, attempt to
acknowledge the autonomy of the temporal sphere and to advocate
justice in the world while maintaining the importance of the spiritual
sphere for evangelization and inspiration.17 Alfredo Fierro cites three
assumptions central to the New Christendom movement: "(1) the lay
character of political institutions; (2) the underlying Christian
inspiration of the state; and (3) the full incorporation of non-Christians
into the state by virtue of its temporal aims as a civil society."18 This
new "social" Christianity envisioned a third political option between
capitalism and socialism that would permit Christian involvement in the
world but still keep the sphere of faith distinct from the world. The
writings of Jacques Maritain greatly influenced "social" Christianity and
its expression in movements such as Catholic Action and Catholic Trade
Unions.19 In continuity with earlier Catholic positions, the New
Christendom model continued to distinguish the salvific work of the
church from the profane work of the world. The model did, however,
recognize that Christian principles could and should inspire and direct
laypersons in this worldly activity. The church still believed in two
planes, one temporal and one spiritual -- but the planes were now to be
differentiated rather than totally separated. Thus the third period is
marked by significant new activity for the Roman Catholic Church, by
the increasing call for reform and independence among the Latin
American people, and by the emergence of a neocolonial relationship
between Latin America and the United States.
The fourth period of history covers the years from 1950 to the present
writing (1980s). This period continues to be marked by Latin American
dependence and capitalist imperialism; that imperialism is now the work
of multinational corporations. The first stage of this period, in the 1950s

and early l960s, covers the model of development represented by the
United Nations Decade of Development. Based on the distinction
between developed and underdeveloped countries, this model assumed
that, with the proper financial aid and technological knowledge,
underdeveloped countries could become like their first-world
counterparts. The project of development also required certain cultural
"improvements": democracy, a large middle class, mass advertising,
high literacy rates. The plan was given popular expression in Walt W.
Rostow's The Stages of Economic Growth: A Non-Communist
Manifesto.20
The second stage of this fourth period in Latin American history begins
with the failure of the developmentalism model. Ten years of
development had resulted in an even worse situation for the poor and
oppressed in Latin America: the befriended countries faced growing
political instability, increased repression of political dissent, and a larger
economic gap between rich and poor.21 Neither a middle class nor a
democracy had developed; instead, military dictatorships were seizing
political control and suspending the basic rights of the masses.
International investors were taking out more profits than they were
putting in aid, and loans from governmental agencies were mere
financial tokens beside the so-called investments of multinational
corporations. The model was further discredited by political events such
as the Brazilian coup of 1964 and Chile's failed Christian Democracy,
not to mention the revelation of the involvement by the United States in
the Dominican Republic.22
The solution to the failure of the development model came in the form
of the concept of a "national security system." Jose Comblin, in The
Church and the National Security State, describes its principles as
"integration of the whole nation into the national security system and
the polity of the United States; total war against communism;
collaboration with American or American-controlled business
corporations; establishment of dictatorships; and placing of absolute
power in the hands of the military."23 The concept of a national security
system was incompatible with the notion of development and its
necessary correlates of freedom and democracy. Instead, cooperation
between oligarchies and multinational corporations, a cooperation
secured by dictatorships and protected by the military, became the
dominant reality. The national security system thus defends the interests
of corporations, foreign governments, and the elites of Latin America. It
uses the issues of geopolitics, military strategy, and security from war to
create a comprehensive system that, in the words of Robert Calvo,
"reflects a predominately military vision of society, the economy, and
culture. The basic elements of society are seen through the world-view
of the professional soldier."24
The situation of the church in this fourth period is the immediate context
for Latin American liberation theology. The system of domination and
repression in which the church and liberation theology find themselves
is but a continuation of a history of imperialism. The history of Latin
America is characterized by the ideological use of Christianity to further
the interest of the ruling party, on the one hand, and, on the other hand,
the painful suffering of the poor whom the church serves. In recent
years, however, the church has taken a much stronger stand with the
poor against both the ideological distortion of Christianity and the
history of domination and repression in Latin America.
THE CHURCH AND AGGIORNAMENTO
The foregoing brief and fragmentary summary of Latin American
history illustrates that, though particular individuals and even groups
have sided with the poor, by and large the church functioned for
centuries to justify the systematic oppression of the "other," the poor. In
part this was due to the theological separation of the spiritual and
temporal spheres, a separation that resulted in little importance being
placed on justice and righteousness in social structures. Along with this
theological tendency to confine faith to a separate sphere, the Roman
Catholic Church sheltered itself from conversation with modernity,
preferring to remain in the Christendom mentality of an earlier era. In
1864 Pope Pius IX's "Syllabus of Errors," an appendix to the encyclical
Quanta Cura, concluded by stating, "if anyone thinks that the Roman
Pontiff can and should reconcile himself and come to terms with
progress, with liberalism, and with modern civilization, let him be
anathema."25 It was, then, a startling change when, in 1960, Pope John
XXIII announced a second Vatican Council in order "to open the
windows of the church to let in fresh air from the outside world."26 This
new movement of "aggiornamento," or renewal, is a major shift in the
church's theological formulations, liturgical practices, and relationships
with the modern world. In Pope John's encyclicals and the Vatican II
documents the church begins to appear as a social actor, ready to serve
and transform human life in history. Pope John's Mater et Magistra,
published in 1961, advocated advances in social relations for the sake of
human rights.27 Vatican II documents such as Populorum Progressio

and Gaudium et Spes emphasized worldly transformation as integral to
the salvation of humanity. Gaudium et Spes, published in 1965, argued
the need for structural change and indicated the special role of
Christianity in working for human dignity. Two years later, in 1967,
Populorum Progressio attacked oppressive social structures and called
for the church to work with others in human solidarity. In the papal
encyclicals and in the Vatican II documents, two basic themes received
special emphasis: the dignity of all people and the interrelatedness of the
peoples of the world. Vatican II marked a new form of critical dialogue
with modern thought and historical involvement in the world. The
temporal and spiritual spheres were no longer separated; the careful
distinctions of the New Christendom model were blurred both
theologically and pastorally. Faith, according to the spirit of Vatican II,
has a new location of historical engagement -- a radical involvement
with the world.
In 1968 the Second General Conference of Latin American Bishops
(CELAM II) met at Medellin, Colombia. The purpose of the Medellin
Conference was to address, in light of Latin America, Vatican II's
concern for human rights and historical transformation. The ensuing
documents of Medellin serve as the founding documents of Latin
American liberation theology; they determine, as well, a direction of
solidarity and liberation through the creation of grassroots communities.
At Medellin the bishops and theologians dealt with three general topics:
(1) the pursuit of justice and peace, (2) evangelization and spiritual
growth, and (3) ecclesiological structures.28 Key words in almost all the
Medellin documents are "conscientization" and "participation" -- both of
which stress the need to facilitate the active involvement of the masses
in decision-making at all levels. Offering an analysis of the unjust
situation in Latin America as a result of internal colonialism as well as
external colonialism, the Medellin documents criticize both socialism
and capitalism. These documents recognize the reality of class conflict
in Latin America, speak of international tensions, call for the
involvement of the poor, and acknowledge the need for agrarian reform.
Any struggle for change, according to the bishops and theologians who
authored the documents, must be a struggle against "institutionalized
violence" -- the violence of the rich against the poor institutionalized in
structures, systems, values, and worldviews. The documents of Medellin
thus portray a new location and foundation for Christian faith in the
Latin American situation, proclaiming: "We wish to affirm that it is
indispensable to form a social conscience and a realistic perception of
the problems of the community and of social structures. We must

awaken the social conscience and communal customs in all strata of
society and professional groups regarding such values as dialogue and
community living within the same group and relations with wider social
groups (workers, peasants, professionals, clergy, religious,
administrators, etc.)."29
Many individuals and groups in the Latin American church opposed the
"liberal" stance taken at Medellin and, by the time of the Third General
Conference of Latin American Bishops (CELAM III), held at Puebla,
Mexico, in 1979 a strong reactionary movement had developed. With
Bishop Lopez Trujillo one of the leaders of the opposition to the
Medellin stance, as the new president of CELAM, it appeared that the
Medellin documents might become mere historical citations. The
meeting was prefaced by intense debates and contradictory preparatory
documents. Yet the documents of Puebla maintain the basic theme of
liberation in the midst of a rather conservative text that stresses the
independence of the church from the powers of the world. Continuing
Medellin's option for the poor and the critique of the dependency of
Latin America, the final documents of Puebla praise the basic Christian
communities but call for serious caution toward the authority and
ideology of popular religion.30
Protestant churches also offered resistance to the political and economic
situation in Latin America. In 1968 the Third Latin American
Evangelical Conference (CELA) focused attention on the present
problems in Latin America, As at the Puebla Conference, positions
taken ranged from identifying the church with the revolutionary struggle
to wanting the church to maintain a hands-off attitude toward all
political positions. In 1978 the Latin America Council of
Evangelization, held in Oaxtapec, Mexico, considered papers on topics
such as power structures in Latin America, indigenous communities,
and human rights.31 Christianity, in both its Protestant and Catholic
expressions, was becoming institutionally and theologically identified
with the oppressed and the struggle for justice in the third world.
THE CONVERSATION WITH MARXISM
As the church became identified with the oppressed, many Latin
American liberation theologians found themselves in conversation with
Marxism -- a conversation called for by the need for specific tools of
social analysis, the search for a new understanding of history and
anthropology, and the demand for new political options. Marxism is, by
now, as much a general attitude emphasizing the historical and
transformative nature of all action and reflection as it is a specific
political structure or set of philosophical assumptions.32 The importance
of praxis, practical reason, and solidarity may be held by those who
have never read Karl Marx as well as by those who have mastered the
works of Marx and have studied all the varieties of revisionary
Marxism.33 As Latin American liberation theology developed, it became
clear that no one particular system of Marxism was essential to its
interpretation of the Christian faith or necessary for its political
strategy.34 Latin American liberation theology carries on a critical
dialogue with Marxism in at least three areas: (1) the general economicsocial-political climate of Latin America, (2) the philosophical
categories of history and anthropology, and (3) political options in
specific situations.
In some ways the greatest effect of Marxism on Latin American
liberation theology may be the latter's analysis of the general climate of
Latin America, an analysis emphasizing class conflict, oppression, and
revolutionary ferment. A Marxist analysis of the ownership of the mode
of production and the Marxist insistence on the necessity for
revolutionary change readily apply to Latin America's massive gap
between the rich and the poor, the "haves" and the "have-nots."35
Indeed, the initial criticism made by Latin American liberation theology
relied upon a Marxist-influenced analysis of the model of
development.36 The theologians elaborated their critique of
developmentalism through the notion of dependency, a notion taken
from the work of Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Enzo Falleto,
Dependencia y Desarrollo en America Latina, which says of the notion
of dependency, in sum: "the relationship of dependency presupposes the
insertion of specifically unequal structures. The growth of the world
market created relationships of dependence (and domination) among
nations."37 This analysis demonstrated that the developmentalism of the
1950s and 1960s presumed a progressive view of exponential growth
similar to the growth found in Western democracies, especially the
United States. Utilizing the dependency theories of the social scientists,
Latin American liberation theologians argued that, ten years after the
beginning of development, the countries targeted for the efforts suffered
even wider gaps between the rich and the poor, greater political
instability, and fewer human rights than ever before.38
Through this analysis of dependency, Latin American theologians
understand their context and their history as being structurally,

culturally, and ideologically dominated by imperialistic systems. In their
effort to analyze this context of oppression and domination, Latin
American liberation theologians stress the importance of critical
dialogue with social scientists, especially those scientists influenced by
Marxism.39 Marxist social sciences offer to liberation theologians an
analysis of the systems of oppression between their countries and the
first-world "empires." Minimally, it can be said that Latin American
liberation theology grows out of a situation in which Marxist analysis
provides some of the interpretations of the social situation.
Latin American liberation theologians are influenced also by certain
"philosophical" categories set forth by Marx. In "The German Ideology"
Marx argued that humanity committed the first historical act in its
production of the means of subsistence, so that the mode of production
is a definite form of the expression of human life. Humanity produces
the means to satisfy needs that in turn creates new needs and humanity
reproduces the species. The production of life, both of one's own labor
and of new life, appears as a double relationship, as Marx himself
indicates: ". . . on the one hand as a natural, on the other, as a social
relationship. By social we understand that cooperation of several
individuals, no matter what conditions, in what manner and to what end.
It follows from this that a certain mode of production, or industrial
stage, is always combined with a certain mode of cooperation, or social
stage, and this mode of cooperation is itself a 'productive force.'"40 For
Marx a certain mode of production is always combined with a certain
stage of cooperation so that consciousness is itself a social product. The
division of labor in society, arising from needs and natural dispositions,
means that the forces of production, the state of society, and
consciousness must come into contradiction with one another.
Somewhat like Hegel's self-realization of the Absolute Spirit, Marx
understood history as evolving through different stages.41 Inherent in
each stage are the seeds of conflict and destruction of that stage as well
as the birth of the next stage. Alienation arises out of the pattern of
ownership in society and occurs when the human subject becomes
estranged from his or her productions. Alienation, in Marx's work, has
four basic characteristics: (1) human subjects are estranged from their
products, (2) there is no intrinsic satisfaction from work, (3) humans
become estranged in their social relationships, and (4) humans do not
fulfill their nature as social beings, what Marx calls "the species-being."
One of Latin American liberation theology's central theological base

points is the demand that the primary arena for God and human action is
history -- the social, political, and economic realities of daily existence.
Latin American liberation theology is openly indebted to Marx for
pointing out the importance of history: "It is," Gutierrez has written, "to
a large extent due to Marxism's influence that theological thought,
searching for its own sources, has begun to reflect on the meaning of the
transformation of this world and the action of man in history."42 Latin
American liberation theology revises the Marxist understanding of
history to include liberation in a mediate relationship to redemption and
to argue that all method is bound by historical conditions and must be
conscious of its own interests, priorities, and goals.
Latin American liberation theology is influenced, as well, by Marx's
social anthropology, especially his understanding that humans both
produce and are produced by history. For Latin American liberation
theology this social anthropology necessitates an analysis of human
existence in relation to its social context.43 Latin American liberation
theologians also revise Marx's category of alienation so that alienation
contributes to and expresses human sinfulness. Though Latin American
liberation theology uses Marx's philosophical categories to mediate and
transform theological categories, that theology is nonetheless critical of
Marxist theory.44 Marx's theory, Latin American liberation theologians
accuse, promises to solve fully the problems of history -- a promise no
theory can keep because of the nature of sin. Alienation, as Marx taught,
may well be constituted by and expressive of systemic structures of
oppression, but as such alienation is also an expression of the tragic
relationship between history and salvation. Likewise, even Marx's
categories of history and anthropology are, for Latin American
liberation theologians, adequately understood only in light of the
Christian notions of creation, sin, and redemption.
The third area of conversation between Marxism and Latin American
liberation theology exists in the consideration of specific political
options for the Latin American countries. This conversation takes place
in a context in which Marxist-influenced groups and Christians
sometimes work together to develop new political systems. The 1970
election of Salvador Allende in Chile marked both the election of a
Marxist head of government and the cooperation of Christians toward
this end. In 1972 Christians for Socialism, meeting at Santiago,
identified socialism as the only acceptable political option but also
called for criticism of Marxist dogmatism. Frequently Latin American
liberation theologians argue for a form of socialism as the most

adequate political structure for the present situation of their countries.
Socialism is "Marxist" in the sense that it advocates that the ownership
of the means of production belongs to the people as a whole or, in Juan
Luis Segundo's definition, "a political regime in which the ownership of
the means of production is taken away from individuals and handed
over to higher institutions whose main concern is the common good."45
Latin American liberation theologians contribute to the quest for a
particular form of Latin American socialism, one that would avoid the
problems of communism and capitalism. In sum, within the general
climate of Latin America, Marxism is a resource and conversation
partner for liberation theology. Latin American liberation theology is
critical of its own use of Marxism, yet it remains in dialogue with
Marxist social science, Marx's philosophy, and with various forms of
socialism.
THE INFLUENCE OF MODERN THEOLOGY
Though Latin American liberation theologians may dialogue with social
sciences, political theory, and various forms of philosophy, they
nonetheless are centrally engaged in an ongoing conversation with
modern theology. Latin American liberation theologians, trained in
twentieth-century theology, retrieve the notions of freedom, grace, sin,
obedience, and redemption as a way to interpret Christian praxis. In this
hermeneutics of retrieval within modern theology, theological concepts
are often radically transformed. For instance, Karl Barth's stress on
obedience to the revelation of God comes to the surface in Jose Miguez
Bonino's vision of theology as the discernment of God's actions in
concrete situations. Likewise, Karl Rahner's interpretation of the
experience of salvation mediated through the affirmation of the self
contributes to Gustavo Gutierrez's notion of salvation mediated through
historical self-realization. Many Latin American liberation theologians
are influenced, as well, by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's emphasis on the
process of history as the conquest for new ways of being human, an
emphasis that, in the works of these theologians, becomes constructed
through social and political structures.46 Latin American liberation
theology continues modern theology's concern for the subject, the
representation of freedom by Christianity, and the experience of faith in
history but, in a radical reformulation, defines the subject as the poor,
reinterprets freedom to include political self-determination, and
envisions history as the arena for both liberation and redemption.
In its early years Latin American liberation theology understood itself as

having real affinities to German political theology. Latin American
liberation theologians agreed with German political theology that faith
and world could no longer be two separate realms; and they agreed that
earlier forms of modern theology had functioned ideologically to justify
the ruling powers of bourgeois society. The critique made by Johann
Baptist Metz and Jurgen Moltmann of the privatization of religion in the
first world was understood by Latin American liberation theologians as
an example of the need for self-critique in theology. To the Latin
American liberation theologians, political theology suggested new
categories of religious language, introducing distinctively political
concepts such as liberation, privatization, ideology, and oppression
through its political hermeneutics. The language of salvation and
redemption now designated concrete historical conditions, thus
providing new possibilities for understanding and speaking to the
pressing problems of oppression, suffering, and poverty. And Latin
American liberation theologians discovered an ally in their German
counterparts in the demand and desire for a new interpretation of
Christian witness -- a witness opposing false consciousness and injustice
while working for human fulfillment in history.
Perhaps the most significant area of both agreement and disagreement
between German political theology and Latin American liberation
theology was the vision of faith acting in a critical relationship to the
world. Jurgen Moltmann, in Theology of Hope, argued for a Christian
faith that disturbs and calls history into question, a position to which
Latin American liberation theology gave its hearty assent. In light of
this critical relationship of Christianity to the world, political theology
identified the church as an agent of historical freedom. Metz's notion of
the church as a critical institution provided a new vision of the nature as
well as the role of the church in the world. But the understanding of how
the church could fulfill its role as a critical institution was significantly
different in Latin America from that in secularized West Germany.47 In
Latin America the church's size, power, and influence could provide it
with many different opportunities for political influence, education, and
service. Latin American liberation theology located its disagreement
with political theology in the dual issues of how the church should be a
critical institution and the nature of theology as a political activity.
Locating the critical activity of the church through its political,
educational, and social activity with the poor, Latin American liberation
theology committed itself not only to interpreting critically the world, in
the tradition of its German counterpart political theology, but also to
transforming that world.

THE SACRAMENT OF GOD AND BASIC CHRISTIAN
COMMUNITIES
At the heart of Latin American liberation theology is the reinterpretation
of Christian faith as a radical engagement of the church in the world. In
the journey of the poor with God, the purpose of the church becomes
one of acting in history as a witness to the God that creates, liberates,
and redeems history. As this witness, the church -- and through it
Christianity -- is a making visible of the invisible, a sacrament of God's
action in history. Gutierrez captures this new interpretation of the
transforming activity of the church in the world: "as a sign of the
liberation of man and history, the Church itself in its concrete existence
ought to be a place of liberation. A sign should be clear and
understandable. If we conceive of the Church as a sacrament of the
salvation of the world, then it has all the more obligation to manifest in
its visible structures the message that it bears."48
Much of the transforming activity of the church takes place in basic
Christian communities, or comunidades eclesiales de base. Basic
Christian communities include a wide variety of small, loosely
structured religious groups involved in projects ranging from Bible
study to political action.49 Through working on concrete problems or
specific tasks, basic Christian communities function as a locus for
conscientization, educational activity that enables persons to participate
more effectively in a variety of political, religious, and social projects.
This education is based on Christian commitment and has a Christian
goal; the commitment is to the privileged option for the poor as the
place of the church and the goal is one of witness and mission to Latin
American society. The commitment and goal often express themselves
through an attempt to work on some local project such as improving the
water system in a neighborhood. Before persons can improve a water
system, they must study the political systems in their society and
understand their rights and duties as citizens; they must educate
themselves to do the necessary tasks and they must accept, through the
process of conscientization in basic Christian communities, the basic
religious responsibility for changing this historical situation.
The major strategy of conscientization developed out of Paulo Freire's
project of liberating education, articulated in his major work, Pedagogy
of the Oppressed.50 This work has been used widely in literacy
campaigns in Brazil, Chile, and other Latin American countries. Freire

proposes that education should be "liberating" and that it be structured
as a mutual ongoing process between co-learners. Education, in the
understanding of Freire, is the practice of freedom and depends on a
political decision to make persons fully active in their concrete situation.
Liberating education stimulates consciousness to emerge through
constant problem-posing in which persons think about the problem and
its social context in a critical fashion. The purpose of liberating
education is for persons to be able to "name the world," to be subjects in
their own history.
Latin American liberation theologians adapt from Freire's work the
process of conscientization, a type of critical theory that helps persons
to become emancipated agents in their social contexts. Conscientization,
in this understanding, is not only a matter of undertaking new projects
and learning new skills; more fully considered, conscientization enacts
freedom, creating a new human subject. Latin American liberation
theologians revise conscientization to name the activity of faith:
becoming human in solidarity with God and with the poor. The
enactment of freedom is not only a process of education but also a
process of grace, dependent upon God's activity with the oppressed.
Thus adapted, conscientization becomes a process of conversion to the
neighbor based on a spirituality of gratuitousness. This conversion to the
"other" and the spirituality of gratuitousness is, in Latin American
liberation theology, a way of procuring the dignity of human persons
and a way of realizing freedom in history. Conscientization is, in
liberation theology, a project of freedom that takes place in small, basic
Christian communities where persons engage their faith, experience
God, and work together for justice.
Basic Christian communities model an ecclesiology that is very much
"of the people" and "in the world." Because basic Christian
communities are located in the concrete praxis of the poor and because
they envision a new way of life for both the church and the society, they
serve as the ecclesiastical context for many Latin American liberation
theologians. Those theologians find in the basic Christian communities
a new way of experiencing and reflecting on Christianity through the
poor, as Gutierrez remarks:
Only these base-level Christian communities, rising up out of the
oppressed but believing people, will be in a position to proclaim and
live the values of the Kingdom in the very midst of the common masses
who are fighting for their liberation. The practice of these communities
continually leads them beyond themselves. The CCBs are a means, a
tool if you will, for the evangelization of all nations from the standpoint
of the poor and exploited. That is why they are transforming our way of
understanding Christian discipleship.. . . They arise in the very process
of living out what Christ means for the common masses, of showing
how the gratuitous gift of the Kingdom is accepted in their efforts to
free themselves from exploitation, defend their rights as poor people,
and fashion a human society that is free and just.51
BASIC THEMES IN LATIN AMERICAN LIBERATION
THEOLOGY
Though Latin American liberation theology began with an economic
critique of developmentalism, it soon expanded its critique to the
cultural realm and the humanistic sciences of cultural interpretation. As
theologians worked in basic Christian communities, attempting to make
sense of the situation in light of their own theological training, they
began to question the nature and method of modern theology. In the
midst of criticizing modernity and serving the poor, Latin American
liberation theology forged a new theological paradigm: representing a
"new" subject outside the realm of modern history; testifying to an
experience of God not found in modern theology; and calling for a new
way of doing theology. Consequently the basic themes of Latin
American liberation theology are three: (I) the "preferential option for
the poor, (2) God as liberator, and (3) the liberation of theology.
The Preferential Option for the Poor
The church's turn to worldly transformation and to concrete issues of
justice results not in a call for charitable sympathy, but for the
recognition of the rights of the poor. The poor are not simply to be
helped, assisted along as the chronically "underprivileged," but must be
granted their rights to speak, to eat, to work, to think. The bishops at
Puebla affirmed the church's preferential option for the poor that
Medellin had established and Latin American liberation theologians had
adopted as a, if not the, basic characteristic of their theology: "With
renewed hope in the vivifying power of the Spirit, we are going to take
up once again the position of the Second General Conference of the
Latin American episcopate in Medellin, which adopted a clear and
prophetic option expressing preference for, and solidarity with, the
poor."52 The preferential option for the poor is the most fundamental
theme of Latin American liberation theology: it illustrates the massive

poverty and oppression of the third world as the major theological
concern; it identifies the Christian faith as a spirituality of evangelical
poverty; and it expresses the experience of God in the journey of the
poor. In sum: the preferential option for the poor locates a paradigm
shift in Christian experience and reflection. The preferential option for
the poor is the solidarity, in memory and hope through Jesus Christ, of
Christianity with the poor, with the despised and dispossessed of the
earth.
The option for the poor reminds us of the situation of Latin America, a
situation that must be seen not through the eyes of those who "make"
history, but through the eyes of those who suffer history. Any critical
understanding of the situation begins in the faces of starving young
children, of adolescents who cannot find productive work, of the
indigenous people (often the poorest of poor), of peasants exiled from
the land that belongs to them, of laborers refused their rights, and of the
aged who have lost their "value" along with their ability to produce. "In
these faces," the bishops at Puebla said, "we ought to recognize the
suffering features of Christ our Lord, who questions and challenges
us."53 The poor are not abstract economic statistics, but represent an
actual way of being in the world -- a way of being conditioned by
cultural, economic, social, political, and international factors. The poor,
the victims of history, are the majority of the Latin American populace.
The preferential option for the poor also recognizes the existence of
popular movements for liberation in Latin America. Indeed, for Latin
American liberation theology, the most important fact in recent history
is what Gustavo Gutierrez calls the "irruption of the poor," the quest of
the poor or the nonperson for self-realization in history.54 This irruption
of the poor, with its various popular movements, is a struggle not only
for economic justice but also for a new way of becoming human. The
struggle seeks to find a new way beyond the oppressive consumerism of
capitalism and the totalitarian control of communism. This quest is
called "liberation" and works for improved economic, cultural, political,
educational, and psychological conditions.
In Latin American liberation theology the preferential option for the
poor identifies Christianity with this quest for liberation. Christianity
takes a preferential though not exclusive option for the poor; it extends
its solidarity with all persons through its solidarity with the poor. The
poor, in Latin American liberation theology, represent the quest of all
persons in the historical project of humanity. Consequently, the

preferential option for the poor is the identification of Christianity with
the human subject. As Gutierrez indicates, "solidarity with the poor,
with their struggles and their hopes, is the condition of an authentic
solidarity with everyone -- the condition of a universal love that makes
no attempt to gloss over the social oppositions that obtain in the
concrete history of peoples, but strides straight through the middle of
them to a kingdom of justice and love."55 The Scriptures reveal that God
in God's gratuitousness chooses to be on the side of the poor; therefore,
the privileged option for the poor is always a religious option and a
religious experience for the Christian.
The option for the poor necessitates a spirituality of evangelical poverty,
since Christianity is itself now a form of poverty, of becoming poor in
imitation of Christ. This praxis of following Christ involves the
identification of the love of God with the love of neighbor.56 Indeed, the
option for the poor suggests a new reality for Christianity -- a reality
now characterized by a praxis of solidarity, a discipleship of service, a
representation of the poor of the world. Christians renounce their
attachment to material goods both as an identification with Christ and
neighbor and as a protest against sin. In this spirituality of poverty,
Christianity does not idealize poverty but takes it on in order to abolish
it. The option for the poor identifies a new form of Christian life, a
mystical/political spirituality of poverty, which, in representation and
service, satisfies the world's hunger, interrupts humanity's sinfulness,
heals history's diseases, and liberates the oppressed.
God as Liberator
At its center Latin American liberation theology embraces the metaphor
of God as liberator. As in other theologies, the metaphors, symbols, and
concepts of this theology are influenced by culture but are formed as
uniquely Christian in light of Scripture, Christian tradition, and church
teachings. The metaphor of God as liberator provokes the movement of
liberating praxis, judges historical situations, recalls the dangerous
memories of Christian tradition, and gives hope for the journey into
freedom. As the central metaphor, God as liberator relates to other
symbols popular in Latin American liberation theology -- to the
suffering Christ, to the church as sacrament of history, to Christ
liberating culture, and to the symbols of popular religion.
For this founding metaphor of God as liberator, the exodus serves as the
paradigmatic event: it unites creation and redemption in the promise of

historical fulfillment. The unity of creation and redemption in liberation
is a basic foundation for the systematic content of Latin American
liberation theology, as Andrew Kirk, author of a text on biblical themes
in liberation theology, observes: "the close line between creation and
historical acts of liberation in a unitary, overall design of God for the
world, gives to liberation theology its chief biblical/theological basis for
considering man's history as an open-ended process for which he is
fundamentally responsible."57 God as liberator indicates that history is
open-ended, with no predetermined finish or final event, and that
salvation is always mediated through history. Latin American liberation
theologians thus claim that "history is one," meaning by this that there is
no special salvific realm above or beyond history. The metaphor of God
as liberator signals the providential relation of God to the world, God
acting in history through human activity for the coming kingdom. Sin
both constitutes and is expressed through historical structures of
oppression; it is the whole of creation, both natural and social, groaning
in travail. This is not to exclude the notion of sin as the willful act of an
individual turning away from God; it is, rather, to make sense of human
pride, hubris, and concupiscence in relation to all of God's creation. Sin
is inclusive of alienation, and alienation must be understood through
social categories.
Christ's person and work must, Latin American liberation theology tells
us, also be considered through the metaphor of liberation.58 Christ is the
suffering Christ, the identification of God with those who suffer under
oppression. In his identification with the poor and in his prophetic
teaching that blesses the poor, Christ models liberation in his revolt
against worldly authorities. Christ gives liberation, for his resurrection
victory sets free the power of faith. Christ discloses the praxis of
solidarity and transformation that Christianity represents: the work of
Christ is both a fulfillment and a transformation of history itself.
As the representation of Christ in history, the church is a sacrament of
history, the visible presentation of God's invisible liberating grace. As
such, the church is the sign of God's liberating activity, witnessing to
that which it signifies through its own praxis of solidarity with the poor.
The role of the church is evangelization, the bringing of good news to
the dispossessed of the earth. The activity of the church proclaims the
gift of God's liberation and operates prophetically in each historical
situation.59 The church is a "sign and instrument of the transformation
of society" in relation to God as liberator.60 All these symbols and
others are interpreted through the central metaphor of God as liberator,

and thus this metaphor becomes the systematic center of Latin
American liberation theology.
The Liberation of Theology
Through the privileged option for the poor and through the root
metaphor of God as liberator, Latin American liberation theology
elaborates a new understanding of human existence and a new
interpretation of Christianity. Its interests are the quest for freedom,
equality, and justice on the part of the poor, those who have been
continually victimized in history; its concerns are false ideology,
structural oppression, human dignity, and a liberating faith. The
language of Latin American liberation theology is that of freedom,
oppression, liberation, spirituality, and politics. It understands the
Christian faith as a force in history that holds the possibility of helping
all persons to become, within history, new people. With these new
interests, concerns, and language, Latin American liberation theology
provides a new way of doing theology, a new form of theological
method.
Consistent with its history and location, Latin American liberation
theology is a church theology -- speaking to the church and guiding,
more often than not basic Christian communities. Within basic Christian
communities, faith is experienced and understood as a praxis; theology
is, quite simply stated, reflection on this praxis. Theology is the work of
the corporate community of Christians reflecting on their faith; it is a
task of faith seeking understanding. As reflection on praxis, Latin
American liberation theology draws upon the social sciences as well as
upon philosophy. As a reflection on faith, it uses the symbols and rituals
of popular religion. Within faith, then, theology is always a second act;
it follows faith as a reflection upon the praxis of the community. In
Latin American liberation theology, theology is a form of practical
reflection: the activity of interpreting, guiding, and criticizing Christian
praxis.
Latin American liberation theology faults modern theology for
becoming a theory that functions as an ideology for the bourgeois,
securing freedom as individual and ahistorical. Arguing that there is no
"objective" theory unaffected by the thinker's historical particularity,
Latin American liberation theology claims that theology must be selfconsciously grounded in praxis. The norms and criteria for
understanding and guiding human life exist in the praxis of particular

communities; as Miguez Bonino notes, "there is no possibility of
invoking or availing oneself of a norm outside of praxis itself."61
Theology must be constantly self-critical, acknowledging its own
participation in history and attempting to position itself in its own social
location.
As the foundation of theology, praxis also suggests that human action
and reflection are inherently oriented toward transformation. Latin
American liberation theologians argue that the truth of theology
involves reason as yet to be realized in history and is therefore temporal
and transformative. Jon Solino, in a speech delivered to the Encuentro
Latinoamericano de Teologia in 1975 in Mexico City, noted two phases
in the Enlightenment, phases that correspond to the differences between
European theology and Latin American liberation theology. European
theology, responding to the first phase of the Enlightenment, believes
liberation to consist of the independence of reason and locates truth in
theoretical rationality. Within the boundaries of reason, European
theology demonstrates the truthfulness and meaningfulness of religion
claims, thus, as Sobrino states, "liberating the faith from any elements of
myth or historical error."62 Latin American liberation theology, within
the second phase of the Enlightenment, responds to the need to confront
and change a given historical situation, "a liberation from the misery of
the world."63 In this second phase of the Enlightenment, the task of
theology is not simply to describe the "is" of each historical situation
but also to suggest the "ought," a new way of being in light of Christian
faith and worldly existence. Sobrino describes theology in the second
phase of the Enlightenment: "Latin American theology is interested in
liberating the real world from its wretched state since it is this objective
situation that has obscured the real meaning of faith. The task, therefore,
is not to understand the faith differently, but to allow new faith to spring
from a new practice."64
In sum: Latin American liberation theology is a new interpretation of
the Christian faith, combining spirituality and politics as part of the
ongoing process of Christian conversion to God and neighbor. It
understands human existence in terms of social agency, and history in
terms of liberation. It reflects on a new subject, the poor, and reads the
Scripture in light of a liberating God. This theology is a practical
reflection, a process of discerning, judging, deciding, and becoming
within a specific community.
As Christian theology always has, Latin American liberation theology

represents faith seeking understanding, a faith of the poor and an
understanding that transforms history. To the first world, Latin
American liberation theology is the voice of the "other" coming from
the underside of history. It is a strongly Christian voice, speaking out of
its journey with God and reinterpreting the Christian tradition in light of
its own context of suffering. To understand this voice we are asked to
view history with other eyes, to displace our own knowledge of God
into the irruption of the poor. Having taken this wager with the victims
of history, we may, in turning to political theology, now hear another
voice and another testimony: the rupture of modern culture, bourgeois
religion, and progressive theology by those who in any account are
themselves the victors of history, but victors deeply aware of the
failings, the fragility, and the faults of their victory.
NOTES
1. Ignacio Castuera, "The Theology and Practice of Liberation in the
Mexican American Context," Perkins School of Theology Journal 29
(Fall 1975):4.
2. Segundo Galilea, "Liberation Theology and New Tasks Facing
Christians," in Frontiers of Theology in Latin America, ed. Rosino
Gibellini, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1974), p.
167.
3. Jose Miguez Bonino, Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation
(Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press, 1975), pp. 22-23.
4. Arthur F.McGovern, Marxism: An American Christian Perspective
(Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1981), p. 173.
5. Portugal also settled the New World, having secured from the papacy
the right to colonize and evangelize the lands it conquered. Though
there are significant differences between Portugal's process of
colonization and that of Spain's, the resulting colonial pact produced the
same effect. Because of the lack of space, this book will trace only the
history of Spanish colonization.
6. Miguez Bonino, Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, p. 5.

7. George Pendle, A History of Latin America (New York: Penguin
Books, 1963), p. 39.
8. Hubert Herring, A History of Latin America from the Beginnings to
the Present (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1961), pp. 129-34.
9. Pendle, A History of Latin America, pp. 56-63; and Enrique D.
Dussel, A History of the Church in Latin America: Colonialism to
Liberation (1492-1979), trans. Alan Neely (Grand Rapids, Mich.:
Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1981), pp. 64-68.
10. Gustavo Gutierrez and Richard Shaull, Liberation and Change, ed.
Ronald H. Stone (Atlanta, Ga.: John Knox Press, 1977), p. 61.
11. Ibid., p. 62. See also Dussel, A History of the Church in Latin
America, pp. 47-48.
12. Pendle, A History of Latin America, p. 93. Portugal's ruling house
fled to Brazil in 1807 to escape Napoleon. In 1816 Don Joao became the
king of two countries, Brazil and Portugal, leaving Brazil in 1821. In
1822 his son Pedro led the move to independence.
13. Suzanne C. Toton, World Hunger: The Responsibility of Christian
Education (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1982), pp. 21-22.
14. Frederick B. Pike, The Conflict between Church and State in Latin
America (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1964), pp. 101-8.
15. J. Andrew Kirk, Liberation Theology: An Evangelical View from the
Third World (Atlanta, Ga.: John Knox Press, 1979), p. 6.
16. Herbert L. Matthews, "Diplomatic Relations," in The United States
and Latin America, The American Assembly, Columbia University,
1959, ed. Herbert L. Matthews (New York: Columbia University Press,
1959), pp. 144-47.
17. Gustavo Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, trans. and ed. Sister
Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1973),
pp. 56-58.
18. Alfredo Fierro, The Militant Gospel, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll,
N.Y: Orbis Books, 1977), p. 55.
19. Dussel, A History of the Church in Latin America, pp. 106-16.
20. Walt W. Rostow, The Stages of Economic Growth: A NonCommunist Manifesto (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University
Press, 1960).
21. For a powerful illustration of this critique, see Penny Lernoux, The
Cry of the People: The Struggle for Human Rights in Latin America -The Catholic Church in Conflict with U.S. Policy (New York: Penguin
Books, 1980).
22. See Gary MacEoin, Revolution Next Door: Latin America in the
1970's (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1971).
23. Jose Comblin, The Church and the National Security State
(Maryknoll, N.Y.:
Orbis Books, 1979), p. 54.
24. Robert Calvo, "The Church and the Doctrine of National Security,"
in Churches and Politics in Latin America, ed. Daniel H. Levine
(Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage Publications, 1979), pp. 134-54.
25. Cited in McGovern, Marxism: An American Christian Perspective,
p. 92.
26. Joseph Gremillion, ed., The Gospel of Peace and Justice. Catholic
Social Teaching since Pope John (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books,
1976), p. 1.
27. Ibid., pp. 143-200.
28. Renato Poblete, "From Medellin to Puebla," in Churches and
Politics in Latin America, ed. Daniel H. Levine, p. 41.
29. Cited in Gremillion, The Gospel of Peace and Justice, p. 452.
30. Phillip Berryman, "What Happened at Puebla," in Churches and

Politics in Latin America, ed. Daniel H. Levine, p. 78.
31. T. S. Montgomery, "Latin American Evangelicals," in Churches and
Politics in Latin America, ed. Daniel H. Levine, p. 93. See also Orlando
E. Costas, Theology of the Crossroads in Contemporary Latin America:
Missiology in Mainline Protestantism: 1969-1974 (Amsterdam
Rodopoi, 1976).
32. For a good introduction to Marxism, see Louis K. Dupre, The
Philosophical Foundations of Marxism (New York: Harcourt, Brace &
World, 1966); Sidney Hook, From Hegel to Marx (New York:
Humanities Press, 1950); George Lichtheim, From Marx to Hegel (New
York: Herder & Herder, 1971); and Nicholas Lobkowicz, ed., Marx and
the Western World (South Bend, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press,
1967).
33. Arthur McGovern warns against the facile assumption that positions
critical of development are necessarily Marxist (Marxism: An American
Christian Perspective, pp. 183-84).
34. Among liberation theologians there are some substantial changes in
the use of Marxist theory in theology. To take a specific example, in
Gutierrez's A Theology of Liberation, the privileged option for the poor
was formulated first through a Marxist theory of class conflict and then
expressed in a spirituality of poverty. In his recent collection of essays,
The Power of the Poor in History: Selected Writings, trans. Robert R.
Barr (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1983), the option for the poor is a
theological argument -- God chooses to be on the side of the poor -- that
is then mediated through sociopolitical categories, including the Marxist
category of class conflict.
35. Underdevelopment and Development: The Third World Today, ed.
Henry Bernstein (Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, 1973).
36. See Gutierrez's criticism of developmentalism in Theology of
Liberation, pp. 84-92; and Miguez Bonino's criticism of development in
Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, pp. 24-36.
37. Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Enzo Falleto, Dependencia y
desarrollo en America Latina: ensayo de interpretacion sociologica
(Mexico City: Siglo Veintiuno, 1969), p. 24.
38. Miguez Bonino summarizes the "history" of dependence: "This

dependence is not a new fact; the Latin American countries came into
'universal' history (the history of the West) as dependent entities under
the Spanish colonization, and were assigned a place in that world: that
of providing resources for Spain (mainly gold and silver, then some
agricultural products) in the trade-capitalism which then predominated.
When capitalism developed in the Northern nations into other states:
industrial and then consumer capitalism, the role of the dependent
nations also changed: they were destined to provide raw materials and
agricultural products first and cheap labor and markets later" (Doing
Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, p. 27).
39. For a criticism of Latin American liberation theology's failure to
justify its use of Marxist social sciences, see John Coleman, "A Political
Theology for America," in his An American Strategic Theology (New
York: Paulist Press, 1982), pp. 280-81.
40. Karl Marx, "The German Ideology," The Marx-Engels Reader, ed.
Robert C. Tucker (New York: W. W. Norton, 1972), p. 157.
41. Ibid., p. 157. See also Richard J. Bernstein, Praxis and Action:
Contemporary Philosophies of Human Activity (Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971), pp. 11-83.
42. Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation, p. 9.
43. Miguez Bonino is especially interested in Marx's notion of the
human subject as 'worker"; see Doing Theology in a Revolutionary
Situation, pp. 108-9.
44. For one critical discussion between Marxist theory and Christian
theology, see Jose Miguez Bonino, Christians and Marxists: The
Mutual Challenge to Revolution Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans
Publishing Co., 1976); see also Juan Luis Segundo, Faith and
Ideologies, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books;
Melbourne:) Dove Communications; London: Sheed & Ward, 1984),
pp. 177-247.
45. Juan Luis Segundo, "Capitalism versus Socialism: Crux
Theologica," in Frontiers of Theology in Latin America, ed. Rosino
Gibellini, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1979), p.

249.
47. Miguez Bonino summarizes the criticism of political theology by
liberation theologians in his discussion of Jurgen Moltmann's work: "but
is it possible to claim a solidarity with the poor and to hover about right
and left as if that choice did not have anything to do with the matter?"
(Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, p. 48).
49. See Thomas C. Bruneau, The Church in Brazil: The Politics of
Religion (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982); see also The
Challenge of Basic Christian Communities: Papers from the
International Ecumenical Congress of Theology, ed. Sergio Torres and
John Eagleson, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1981).
50. Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, trans. Myra Bergman
Ramos (New (York: Herder & Herder, 1970).
51. Gustavo Gutierrez, "The Irruption of the Poor in Latin America and
the Christian Communities," in The Challenge of Basic Christian
Communities: Papers from the International Ecumenical Congress of
Theology, ed. Sergio Torres and John Eagleson, p. 118.
52. English citations of the Puebla text come from Puebla and Beyond,
ed. John Eagleson and Philip Scharper (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books,
1979), par. 1134.
53. Ibid., par. 31.
54. Gutierrez, "Irruption of the Poor in Latin America and the Christian
Communities," pp. 108-12.
55. Gutierrez, Power of the Poor in History p. 129.
56. Galilea, "Liberation Theology and New Tasks Facing Christians," p.
179.
57. Kirk, Liberation Theology, p. 111.

58. For Latin American christologies of liberation, see Leonardo Boff,
Jesus Christ, Liberator (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1978); Jon
Sobrino, Christology at the Crossroads: A Latin American Approach,
trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis .Books, 1978); and Jose
Miguez Bonino, ed., Faces of Jesus: Latin American Christologies,
trans. Robert R. Barr (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1984).
59. Comblin, Church and National Security pp. 214-24.
60. Ronaldo Mufioz, "Ecclesiology in Latin America," in The Challenge
of Basic Christian Communities: Papers from the International
Ecumenical Congress of Theology, ed. Sergio Torres and John
Eagleson, p. 157.
62. Jon Sobrino, "Theological Understanding in European and Latin
American Theology," in his The True Church and the Poor, trans.
Matthew J. O'Connell (Mary-knoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1984), p. 12.
63. Ibid.
64. Ibid., p. 20.
16

Chopp
Chapter 2: Political Theology

German political theology arose in the 1960s during a period of intense
secularization for the culture and churches of Western developed
nations. Western churches sought to take a new global role in Vatican II
and the 1966 Geneva Assembly of the World Council of Churches. In
the academy, theologies of secularization became popular, embracing
the secular world as the natural outcome of the Christian tradition.
These theologies spoke of play, the city, the Dionysian person, and
student protests as a part of the Christian blessing on the world. Yet the
euphoria of the 1960s gave way to a mood of sobriety with the horrors
of Vietnam, the failures of student protests, and the recognition of
massive corruption in governments. Disenchantment with the
secularized world was accompanied by increasing dismay at the
positivist approaches in science, philosophy, government, and
technology -- approaches that sought to plan and control both developed
and underdeveloped societies.1
In the midst of this ambiguous cultural situation, political theologians
declare that only a radical transformation can save the human subject
and the Christian tradition. Western society and modern Christianity, the
political theologians argue, have elevated themselves at the expense of
those who suffer; the West has become a tower of success for a few
victors on a human platform of many victims. Events such as
Auschwitz, political theology maintains, reveal not only the dreadful
plight of our times but also locate the "new" subject of modernity's
collapse, the subject of suffering. The true purpose of Christianity,
maintains political theology, is to represent this human subject, the
subject who suffers, through the retrieval of the dangerous memory of

Jesus Christ. To oppose the suffering that Western culture and religion
have both caused and forgotten, political theology urges conversion to a
new way of being human and a new way of following Christ.
Political theology relocates the subject in suffering and reinterprets
human existence through the praxis of freedom; political theology
continues the Christian tradition only through its insistence that
Christianity is the continual transformation of suffering and hope in the
dangerous memory of Christ. But in the radical reinterpretations of the
subject and Christian tradition, political theology carries forward the
project of modern theology -- the project of understanding the human
subject by the mediation of Christian tradition and contemporary
existence. Consequently, to understand political theology, we must
begin by following the project of modern theology, paying special
attention to its own change and development through its engagement
with culture. By following the project of modern theology we shall
come to dwell, for a time, in the contemporary context, the cultural
home, of political theology, arriving at an understanding of political
theology as a "situated theology." In its own cultural home, political
theology attempts to respond to the issues of ideology critique,
pluralism, relativism, and praxis. Finally, we shall explore the rupture
and transformation of modern theology that characterizes political
theology: very much a part of its own culture and an inheritor of modern
theology's project, political theology seeks not only to understand the
subject, mediating tradition and existence, but to form the subject,
transforming both tradition and existence in a practical, fundamental
fashion.
THE PROJECT OF MODERN, WESTERN THEOLOGY
Before modernity the world view of Christendom centered on God who,
in turn, determined the very parameters of life. God started the world by
shaping, molding, creating it out of nothing; undoubtedly God would
end the world in judgment and glory. God caused miraculous events to
occur in a natural order that, for its very rhythms, depended on God's
desires. Jesus was a God-Man, both divine and human, supernatural and
natural, bearing the special gift of grace that added to or completed
nature. Life, lived in the realm of the natural infused with the
supernatural, was but a temporary passage full of travails and sorrows,
leading to a fulfillment that existed beyond this world. There were two
planes -- one eternal, never changing, the realm of God, and the other
tragic, full of hardships, the sphere of human life. That sphere, the
world, was imposed as fate; religion was bestowed upon the world to
point above to eternal, unchanging salvation. Theologians reported on
eternal truths given by God, enshrined in doctrine, and protected by the
holy church.
In the modern world this world view was shattered by the progressive
autonomy of Western "man."2 Humanity gained the powers to
determine, if not the very parameters of birth and death, then certainly
the quality, values, and substance of life. The genesis of the world was
interpreted through the theory of evolution, and the telos of life was
located in history, a history that was rapidly progressing toward
perfection. Modernity viewed the world as material for construction and
envisioned the goal of life to lie in present satisfaction. As the
intellectual partner of modernity, the Enlightenment threw off
traditional authorities -- especially traditional religious authorities -- for
the sake of free, autonomous reflection: with almost total reverence for
the autonomy of the human person, the Enlightenment fervently
worshiped history as the representation of the human subject.
Philosophy and theology reflected on human subjectivity and human
consciousness. Disciplines like sociology and psychology were
designed to study "humanity," who now contained a psyche that could
be adapted, reformed, and revolutionized to meet changing needs.
Science explored nature as an environment that could be influenced,
manipulated, and controlled. Knowledge, culture, economics, science,
the arts, politics, and history all found their center in the human subject.
Modernity achieved its freedom, in part, through the destruction of the
intimate ties between religion and society; the medieval marriage
between church and state was forever rent asunder by society itself.
Major religious foundations were not merely questioned; they were
destroyed. The particularistic myths of religion were surrendered to the
realms of the private, retained as superstitions for the weak-minded or
ignorant. On the other hand, the formal ritual of religion received
special recognition for its social usefulness in maintaining the state.
Modernity was, after all, a leap from a religious-mythical, natural world
to a rational-functional, historical world. This leap from a divinized to a
humanized world demanded more than the mere dismissal of individual
beliefs about the location of heaven, the creation of the world, or the
role of miracles in nature.3 Modernity depended on the ability to
experience and reflect on life in a historical fashion. Historical
knowledge construes events in relation to causes and effects; it
considers events in relation to other events, a consideration that

excluded the possibility of human knowledge of supernatural events.
Theologians such as Friedrich Schleiermacher and Ernst Troeltsch
recognized the challenge that historical knowledge presented to
Christian theology. Ernst Troeltsch identified three principles of
historical inquiry: (1) the principle of criticism -- no absolute truth or
falsity can be assured, but only degrees of probability; (2) the principle
of analogy -- judgments can be made on the basis of similarity between
present and past experience; and (3) the principle of correlation -- one
occurrence has effects on an entire set of relations.4 Troeltsch correctly
understood that these principles necessitate, among other things, that
miracles cannot be a subject for historical inquiry, since miracles
exclude probability, deny any similarity in history, and preclude
correlation with other historical events. Moreover, these principles of
historical inquiry create a divided loyalty for the theologian; the
theologian, as Van Harvey suggests, must now live by the canons of
historical inquiry as a modern person, as well as by the canons of church
teaching as a Christian.5 On the one hand, as a citizen of modernity and
a member of the modern academy, the theologian must abide by the
guiding propositions and ruling methods of historical inquiry. On the
other hand, as a believer in religious doctrine and loyal member of the
church, the theologian must remain faithful to traditional teaching and
dogma. Would the theologian part company with the church and not
reflect on the logos of the Theos? Or would the theologian forgo his or
her place in modernity and thus never be heard in the academy? Did the
theologian (and the believer) have to choose between being rational and
being religious?
Or could the rational itself be religious, grounded in a Christian
acceptance of history? Believing that modernity was based on a
Christian impulse, liberal Protestant theologians sought to reinterpret
archaic, misplaced, and even superstitious religious beliefs.6
Unabashedly modern people, the liberals were committed to modern
historical inquiry and to the belief that history was progressively
improving. Well within the ethos of their times, they formulated an
optimistic theology, based on the belief that the force progressively
improving nature, morality, and knowledge was understood correctly as
God. In this way liberal theologians demonstrated that theology need
not be opposed to rational inquiry and that religion need not be opposed
to modernity.
Liberal theology reconciled modernity and religion: modernity corrected

the artificial trappings of religion, and religion in turn used its essence to
ground and bless modernity. Religion did not depend on miracles, the
liberals exclaimed, for history itself displayed the impulse of the
religious.7 Theologians used historical criticism to explain the person of
Jesus as a great moral figure, as a religious archetype, as a privileged
picture of love and charity.8 Hand in hand with modernity, liberal
theologians studied the human subject as the location and realization of
religion; though the object of religion, God, could no longer be studied
directly, human consciousness provided a subject that, when properly
interpreted, reflected the "whence" of existence, God.
Liberal theology was, as Langdon Gilkey has noted, a courageous and
important movement in theology.9 Liberal theologians made
Christianity relevant to human history and bestowed upon the faith a
new identity -- the identity of representing the ultimate essence of free
human life. In so doing, liberal theology established an agenda of an
ongoing conversation between modernity and Christianity, a
conversation that continues even in contemporary political theology.
But in the manner in which it formulated the agenda, liberal theology
was largely a project of accommodation. Christianity's content was
replaced by a picture of the historical Jesus; its form was dependent on
the progressive evolution of history; its telos was tied to the
Enlightenment ethos of optimism. Liberal theology became a member
of modernity, but preserved little, if any, of Christianity's non-identity
with the world. Christianity, in liberal theology's version, was reduced
to being entirely "of this world."
Liberal theology met its demise with the turn of the twentieth century
and the almost total breakdown of any belief in moral and evolutionary
progress.10 Optimism was replaced with pessimism; life was not
characterized by progress, pleasure, and reason but by anxiety, fear, and
despair. Alienation existed as a break in the meaning of history rather
than a temporary delay in progress. In both East and West, freedom
became threatened by the technical manipulation of society. Two world
wars failed to solve the problems of aggression and violence, of right
and wrong, of oppression and totalitarianism.
Modern theology responded to these times of despair with neoorthodoxy, which included various forms of existentialist,
transcendental, and personalist theologies.11 For the neo-orthodox
theologians, the meaning of life and the experience of God could not be
identified with this empty, broken mess called history. If life had any
meaning, any hope, any religious value, it had to come from that which
is beyond or outside of history. Only a Wholly Other God, as Karl Barth
said, could both judge and save human life.12 Reflecting its own cultural
situation, neo-orthodoxy refused to put any faith in historical progress.
Nor would it depend on historical knowledge to secure the essence of
Christianity by recovering the religion of Jesus. Indeed, historical
inquiry and scholarship, as important as they were, could and must be
kept separate from religious faith. Faith could not depend on the
vicissitudes of scholarship any more than it could depend upon the
changes of history. To the liberal puzzle of the proper adjudication
between historical knowledge and religious truth, neoorthodox
theologians offered the strategy of demythologization, using historicalcritical methods to strip away the dated vessels of biblical myths in
order to occasion a new encounter with the Christ of faith.13 The Bible
could be home, both for the historian who studies it through historical
inquiry and for the religious believer who receives it in encounter and
engagement.
It is significant that neo-orthodox theology secured faith outside the
process of history. Neither faith nor God could be arrived at through
limited, changing reason but only through the unlimited gift of
revelation in Jesus Christ. As Karl Rahner suggested, God gives,
through grace, an immediate relationship that fulfills and authenticates
the human subject.14 This was not to deny the autonomy of reason;
indeed, it courageously distinguished the realms of revelation and
reason. Revelation could not be reduced to scientific facts or sublated
within the general ordering of human history; though revelation
occurred through human history, it was never to be identified with
history. But neo-orthodoxy, despite its name, did not return to a
premodern view of revelation as supernatural "truths" buttressed by the
belief in miracles.
Neo-orthodoxy committed itself to the modern world; it accepted
science and historical inquiry but it also confronted the despair and
meaninglessness of the twentieth century Formally, the problem of neoorthodoxy was the problem of liberalism -- how to understand and give
meaning to the human subject in the modern world. Though the world
was, for the neo-orthodox theologians, pessimistic and tragic rather than
optimistic and progressive, it nonetheless presented a cognitive
challenge -- a challenge neo-orthodoxy answered by locating faith in an
encounter between the individual and God. Neo-orthodox theologians
portrayed faith as personal, individual, and interior; thus, said its critics,
neo-orthodoxy worked through history to get beyond history.
Like liberal theology before it, neo-orthodoxy paralleled the mood and
ethos of its historical situation; like liberal theology, it maintained the
relevance of Christianity by making it the true representation of human
meaning, value, and worth. But neo-orthodoxy contradicted liberalism,
emphasizing the non-identity of Christianity with the world and making
the "not being of this world" the locus of faith. Neo-orthodoxy replaced
the immanence of the liberal God, who threatened to become a
deification of humanity, with the transcendence of its Wholly Other God
as Lord and Judge of all.
Neo-orthodoxy and liberalism might be warring neighbors, but they did
live in the same neighborhood -- the dwelling of progressive
Christianity within a modern world. Though the forms, understandings,
and answers might be radically different, theology was, nonetheless, the
interpretation of human existence and Christian tradition in the present
situation. In so doing, through both liberalism and neo-orthodoxy,
theology set for itself a distinct agenda: (a) understanding and giving
meaning to the human subject, (b) the creative reinterpretation of
tradition as the faithful representation of tradition, and (c) the
interpretive role of theology in mediating the relationship of human
existence and Christian tradition. With this agenda we move on to a
cultural situation different from that of either neo-orthodoxy or
liberalism, a situation that summons forth a new form of modern
theology -- a form that, in continuity with the agenda of modern
theology, reinterprets both Christianity and human existence.
THE CULTURAL SITUATION OF POLITICAL THEOLOGY
The 1960s were, altogether, a period of radical questioning in the form
of various critiques -- the "opting-out" of flower children, the radicalism
of antiwar protesters, the emphasis on environmental ethics, a
philosophical utopianism, growing resistance to governmental controls
and planning, and demands for the liberation of women, blacks, and
other minorities. These critiques shared the common sentiment that
something was wrong on a massive global scale and that the future must
be radically different from the present. The critiques also indicated the
emergence of a new cultural situation: modernity was becoming aware
of its many different members. This recent period of modernity, with its
critiques and questions, is the context for political theology. It can be
explored through the examination of the following four features: (1)

ideology critique, (2) pluralism, (3) relativism, and (4) praxis.
Ideology Critique
The first feature of the contemporary period, ideology critique, points to
the social distortions of modernity, distortions calling into question the
very rationality and freedom of the project of modernity. In recent years
ideology critique has become a nightly media event, a ritual unveiling of
modernity's illusions, contradictions, and distortions. Scientific
"advances" tempt the destruction of this planet; manufacturing
techniques result in acid rain that destroys plant life. The ability to
control nature threatens in the end to destroy the human race, which
seems to have forgotten its own dependence on nature. Bureaucratic
organizations routinely command human actions -- in a bureaucracy
persons are parts that can easily be discarded and replaced. Equality is
determined more in the marketplace than in the voting booth. Modern
freedom and reason create the power of nuclear weapons, with which
humanity is at the center of not only experience, history, and knowledge
but even time and space. What could be more free and autonomous?
What could be more irrational and oppressive?
The victims of history accuse modernity of building its progress upon
their suffering. The Jews recall the memories of the Holocaust; the
survivors testify to modernity's project of "extermination." Women
accuse patriarchal modernity of ensuring misogyny by representing
women as inferior through biology, sociology, psychology, religion, and
history Blacks realize that their emancipation from slavery was far too
often liberation into hunger, homelessness, and joblessness. Latin
Americans denounce their history as the industrial colony of the first
world.
These various forms of ideology critique question the prevailing
structures and systems of reality, especially as those systems are
reflected in symbolic, structural, and epistemic "views of reality." Many
of the critical theories of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries have
been powerfully retrieved, elucidating the various distortions within
modernity These modern masters of suspicion include Karl Marx, who
accused the bourgeoisie of hiding behind an ideology that masks their
greedy interests, keeps the poor impoverished, and protects their
privileged existence. Sigmund Freud disclosed to us the power of the
unconscious in influencing our meanings, motivations, and behaviors.
Fried-rich Nietzsche warned that our conscious reflections on freedom

disguise our unconscious drives for individual power. In recent years the
critiques of modernity have increased and expanded even beyond those
who place themselves in the tradition of Marx, Freud, or Nietzsche.
Hans-Georg Gadamer denies the very notion of autonomous reason and
argues that reason is always based on tradition.15 Michel Foucault
argued that the "human subject" is a construct of society;16 Alasdair
McIntyre accuses the Enlightenment project of being incapable of
morality because of its inherent emotivism.17 Jacques Derrida criticizes
modernity's "metaphysics of presence" for covering up the irreducibility
of "difference" that constitutes all of life.18 The critiques of modernity
arise not only from its victims, but also from its citizens.
In sum, the cries and demands of its victims and the internal critique by
its own "citizens" threaten to rupture the very project of modernity:
together they accuse modernity of the distortion of reason and of the
systematic oppression and repression of humanity. Modernity is built on
a foundation, a foundation of its victims, whom it pushes into and past
the very margins of its history.19
The Enlightenment is grounded in a reason that denies its own location
and seeks to cover its own irrationality. Modernity is guaranteed by its
freedom, the freedom of a greedy culture that stuffs itself with goods
and services and forgets its memories and its wounds. Ideology critique - be it on picket lines, in consciousness-raising groups, or academic
texts -- reveals that the freedom of modernity is defined through control
and domination.
Religion is understood by many of the masters of suspicion as yet
another false ideology, one more illusion. Marx, following Feuerbach,
called religion the "opiate of the people" and regarded it as one more
form of ideology. Jews and women question the ideological distortions
alive in the Christian Scriptures. Indeed, simple observation indicates
that religion is far too often used to placate those who suffer and to
siphon off any critical energy through charitable goodwill. Christians,
however, are also among the voices both on the margins and in the
center, crying out against the distortions within modernity. A new form
of Christian witness and reflection begins emerging in various
grassroots movements and base communities. Seminaries and churches
reassess their witness in light of Christian tradition and reconsider their
mission in light of cultural needs. But is this too another illusion? Or do
religion and theologians have something to contribute? On which side
of the dialectic of Enlightenment does Christianity stand?

Pluralism
Contemporary existence may well be best characterized by the word
"pluralism": the reality of a multiplicity of world views, ethics,
religions, roles, and people. Once human existence was described in the
language of "common," "shared," "we," and the stranger was
encountered only in exotic travels or in extraordinary, chance
encounters. But now our language refers to "difference," "variations,"
and "the other," and now the stranger lives next door: the pluralism of
modernity is a basic fact of human existence. Most surprisingly of all,
we realize that the modern Western world is not a monolithic culture:
culture is not a melting pot but a smorgasbord of different beliefs, work
habits, and ways of leisure. Pluralism is the reality of otherness and
difference on both a common-sense and a philosophical level.
Considered alternatively as different representations of the same mass
culture or as differences in constituting values, world views, and belief
structures, pluralism is both a fact and a value in the present situation.
Pluralism can be understood as a fact -- the fact of otherness and
difference within the present period. Pluralism can also be understood as
a value -- the value placed upon living together, not despite but through
the differences.
But pluralism also connotes that any one person lives in many different
worlds; a person may work in one part of town, live in another, and
belong to a club in still a third area. And each of these areas may be
totally unrelated, with the only intersection being the person. In each
area the person plays a different role: in one, the person might bean
attorney, in another a mother or father, and in the third a friend, or
ballplayer, or member of an interest group. Different value structures,
symbolic worlds, and community ties may operate in the different
worlds of any one individual. Pluralism is the variety and the intensity
of different ways and dimensions of living.
In religion pluralism means that the social world of the believer is no
longer composed of persons who attend the same church, hold the same
beliefs, or even worship the same God. Consequently families may
combine a mixture of religious beliefs -- beliefs that ancestors fought
wars to keep apart. Such religious pluralism poses a question: Do these
differences in belief make any real difference? Moreover, pluralism
does not simply refer to the different groups within Christianity; it also
acknowledges the awareness of religions other than Christianity. What

can Christianity learn and what can it contribute to world religions?
Theologians ponder the radical monotheistic God in Christianity: Is God
one among the many? Theologians wonder where and how religion fits
in all the pluralism of an individual life: Does religion bind together all
the various pieces, ground the whole of life, or exist as one function
among many? Finally, in this reality of pluralism the theologian must
speak to the different publics of church, society, and academy. David
Tracy has argued that in these different publics the theologian must
struggle with all the implications and questions of pluralism: the
diversity of interpretations, multiple claims for truth and meaning, a
variety of conceptual schemes, and differences in beliefs and values.20
Relativism
In the contemporary period pluralism exists hand in hand with
relativism. Relativism names the belief that there is no underlying unity,
no becoming, no transcendence in or beyond history. There is, in the
most extreme expressions of relativism, no possible method or process
capable of making translations or comparing different conceptual
schemes or value structures. Philosophically, relativism maintains that
even the concepts we use to comprehend reality -- concepts such as
history, humanity, and natural rights -- are themselves culturally
conditioned. Reason is not only historical; it is also culture-bound.
There are no universal, transcendental, or general rules even for
conversation. Indeed, any attempts at translation or comparison are
simply ideological cover-ups for some latent form of imperialism or
universalism. In this sea of relativism, we may wonder if there is any
way to settle the difference: you believe one way because, by an
accident of birth, you were born in a particular culture; I believe another
way because I, through my own birthright, inherited a different cultural
code. Relativism confronts the contemporary age with a multiplicity of
options without any criteria for choosing among these options.21
Is religion just another conceptual system, belief structure, or world
view? Furthermore, is the very concept of religion bound to Western
culture itself? Are the differences between religions reducible to
differences in cultures and systems? Is dialogue even possible? For the
theologian, relativism questions the role of religion (Is it a conceptual
system?) as well as its relativity (Is it just one more conceptual system,
no better or worse than the others?). If the most extreme assertions of
relativism are true, then Christianity's claims to universalism, by way of
universal redemption or in speaking for the universal human subject, are

but two forms of the same cultural illusion.
Praxis
Increasingly, discussions of ideology critique, relativism, and pluralism
lead to a consideration of praxis. Praxis is, positively stated, the
realization that humans make history and, negatively stated, the
realization that humans cannot rely on any ahistorical, universal truths
to guide life. In recent years we have come to understand praxis as
foundational, recognizing ideology critique, relativism, and pluralism as
appealing to human praxis for criteria and norms of both reflection and
action.22 Hence, even though the relativist makes a theoretical case for
the inability to compare different value systems, in practice humans
with quite different systems live, work, and act together. Likewise, the
pluralism that composes present human praxis provides possibilities for
growth and enrichment in various political, cultural, and personal
spheres. In attending to the ongoing norms and meanings in concrete
human activity, praxis also entails the fact of power and interest in
human interactions.23 Though praxis is no less ambiguous than theory,
concrete action contains suggestions and possibilities for critical
evaluation and transformation.
Praxis suggests, then, a bringing together of action and reflection,
transformation and understanding. This new marriage of action and
reflection depends on accepting human life as fundamentally practical.
It is through this foundation of praxis that there may be a transformative
influence of critique, a powerful enrichment of pluralism, and a
continual adjudication of relativism. Within the rich possibilities of
praxis, there are, of course, different forms and versions of how praxis
provides new possibilities for action and reflection. Some attend to
language itself as the most basic form of human activity, seeking in
language the norms for human action and reflection. Others study the
traditions of literature, memories, stories, and symbols for visions that
might criticize situations of oppression and provoke new cultural
possibilities. Still others commit themselves to particular movements of
emancipatory activity, hoping to influence human praxis through
particular political activity. Whatever the form praxis takes, it involves
the constructive attempt to take seriously the relativism, the pluralism,
and the distortions of modernity.
In this factor of the present cultural situation, Christianity is understood
as a particular religious praxis, and religion is understood as part of

human praxis. Two issues popular with contemporary Christians are
social action and spiritual development, both forms of concrete praxis.
Christians struggle to "live out" their faith through prayer, meditation,
and religious discipline or through action, witness, and prophetic
testimony, or through both. Christian theologians follow different routes
to place praxis at the center of theological reflection. Critical of the
Enlightenment tendency to locate religion in common human
experience, some theologians advocate a radical Christian praxis, a way
of life that is set apart from the rest of the world.24 Other theologians
place the practical activities of appropriation and transformation at the
center of theological hermeneutics.25 Still other theologians find the turn
to praxis a way of making theology less a false ideology, less an
academic illusion, and less an incoherent abstraction.26 Indeed, practical
theology, theology as praxis, and theological reflection on praxis
become new forms of theological method.
Taken together, these cultural factors portray a central paradox of
modernity -- the quest for both particularity and universality. We live in
a global culture, constantly aware of ourselves as citizens of a world.
But we inhabit history through particular ways, with particular
traditions, symbols, dreams, and desires. Any quest for a global
community will succeed only as it assures the radical otherness and
difference within history itself. This paradox is not simply a theoretical
or ecclesiastical concern; it is the living reality of most if not all men
and women. The paradox is experienced as a crisis: a crisis that the
theories and institutions and symbols of the past may be false and
oppressive; a crisis that the particularity of Western modern culture has
been universalized as the true, the good, and the beautiful. The paradox
must also be experienced as a possibility -- the possibility of learning,
perhaps for the first time, to live together with our differences and to
recognize others without having to identify the other as inferior.
It should be clear that neither the crisis nor the possibilities of the
present situation can be fully addressed through neo-orthodoxy with its
despairing individual before the radically transcendent God. Just as neoorthodoxy had to overthrow liberalism because of its failure to
understand existence adequately and to interpret Christianity
appropriately, so too is neo-orthodoxy affirmed, negated, and
transformed by the emergence of political theology. The problems of
existential meaninglessness and despair needed the response of neoorthodoxy; the problems of pluralism, relativism, and ideology critique
require a theology that is both "public" and "critical," one that is both
"open" and "transformative." In this cultural situation, modernity is both
shattered and transformed; political theology must share with its own
situation the spirit of rupture and revolution. Indeed, as we shall see, it
is in the revolution of modern theology that political theology continues
the agenda of its theological parents.
POLITICAL THEOLOGY: STAGE ONE
Political theology originates as a critique of neo-orthodoxy's
individualism and modernity's ambiguities. Political theology becomes a
form of ideology critique through its attention to the ideological
function of religion, the daily conformity of the bourgeoisie, and the
victims of suffering in modernity Moreover, the nature of the critique
defines two distinguishable stages of political theology.27 In the first
stage political theology emerges as a corrective to neo-orthodoxy -correcting the problems of individualism and existentialism through the
interpretation of a God who creates and redeems history from the future.
In the second stage political theology becomes an interruption of
history, a critique of the very foundations of the subject, of freedom, and
of reason through the history of suffering.
To begin the first stage -- in which political theology is formulated as a
critical corrective -- Johann Baptist Metz sounds the charge to neoorthodoxy: The religious consciousness formed by this theology
attributes but a shadowy existence to the socio-political reality. The
categories most prominent in this theology are mainly the categories of
the intimate, the private, the apolitical sphere.. . . The category of
encounter is predominant; the proper religious way of speaking is the
interpersonal address; the dimension of proper religious experience is
the apex of free subjectivity of the individual or the indisposable, the
silent center of the I-Thou relation.28
Political theologians argue that neo-orthodoxy simply went along with
the ethos of the day by allowing Christianity to be used as an escape for
the middle-class subject. Religion was reduced to a matter of personal
opinion and taste, which had little public import and no critical impetus.
By its obsessive concentration on the abstract, privatized individual, neoorthodoxy, in the assessment of political theology, failed to recognize
that anxiety, despair, and loneliness were social problems in a bourgeois
society. In contrast, for the political theologians the human subject
whom theology addresses is always and only a social subject, who
realizes meaning, value, and truth through concrete historical

particularities. Furthermore, according to this critique, neo-orthodoxy
also misread the Bible and misinterpreted Christian tradition. Neoorthodoxy's method of demythologization -- reading "through" the
myths to occasion the religious encounter -- rendered the biblical texts
formless and timeless, and thus protected the privatized religiosity of the
bourgeoisie. Political theology judges neo-orthodoxy as another form of
Christianity's accommodation to modernity -- avoiding the critical and
practical challenges of the Enlightenment, ignoring the real human
subject, and denying the critical import of Christianity.
In this first stage of political theology, the antidote to neo-orthodoxy is
provided by eschatology. From the eschatological center of Christian
faith, political theologians argue that history is characterized by an
orientation to the future.29 The importance of eschatology demands a
critical role for Christianity in society and requires a new understanding
of and method for theological reflection. Eschatology is the most
dominant theme of the first stage, and includes at least three
distinguishable emphases.
First, the theme of eschatology suggests a particular interpretation of the
contemporary situation: oriented to new forms of social and political
structures, the contemporary situation is one of ferment and change,
characterized by ideology critique, pluralism, and relativism. History is
oriented to the new, the future: time itself has an implicit orientation to
the new, the not-yet. Humanity does not live by the repetition of the past
(the classical view) or by the representation of the present (the modern
view), but by the mediation of past and present through the future. The
present is always relative, always penultimate to that which is to be in
the future.
In this understanding of history as oriented to the future, political
theologians were influenced by the philosopher Ernst Bloch.30 Bloch's
philosophy can be summarized in his slogan: the subject is not yet the
predicate (S is not yet P).31 For Bloch the human being, the natural
world, and history all have the fundamental character of not-yet being:
nature moves toward the future; history experiments; the human
hopes.32 For humanity's utopian desires, Bloch searched daydreams,
visions, stories, myths, and folklore, all of which provide the material
for a critique of the present situation and the impetus for revolution.
Because the stories of religion have so often expressed humanity's
future yearnings, Bloch defined religion as that which reveals the telos
of reality. Therefore, Bloch concluded, God is a projection of what

humanity is, the desire for the future.
Political theology found much to agree with in Bloch's understanding
that history, nature, and the human person are all oriented to the new;
but, for the political theologians, this lure of the future comes solely
from God. The second emphasis of eschatology is an explicitly religious
foundation for the "natural" orientation to the new in history. The
promises given by God and revealed through the Bible create history;
history is the time between the bestowal of the promises of God and
their fulfillment by God.33 Indeed, God is interpreted as "wholly
transforming," present in history from the future, constantly realizing
God's promises. Metz offers the notion of the eschatological proviso as
the relation of nonidentity between God and history, the not-yet between
the future and the present.34 The eschatological proviso signifies that
every present manifestation is partial and incomplete.
If eschatology provides a more adequate way to understand human
existence, and a way far more appropriate to Christian tradition, it also
offers political theology a different, more critical, function for the
Christian church in society from its own eschatological center in the
resurrected Lord, the church criticizes every penultimate fulfillment of
history. For Metz the church as a critical, institution of freedom exists
under the eschatological proviso to criticize the: relative nature of all
systems and structures.35 So, too, for Moltmann the role of the church in
society is to proclaim the critique and transformation of history by
God.36 Calling into question the present nature of society, the church
pronounces the eschatological newness of history and demonstrates the
relative accomplishments and failures of the present order.37
Moltmann and Metz argue that political theology must correct
neoorthodox by bringing the eschatological center of the Christian
message into dialogue with the particular concerns of the present
situation. For both theologians this correction changes the method and
nature, as well as the content, of theology. Political theology involves,
in this final theme of the first stage, an inquiry into a new relation
between theory and praxis in theology. The new turn to praxis in
theology necessitates that theology cannot merely reflect on doctrines or
on abstract categories of existence but, rather, must begin its reflection
within the concrete socio-political situation.
It should be observed that, throughout this first stage, the term "political
theology" is a troublesome term, a name reminding many critics of the

very ambiguous results of other political theologies. In ancient Greece
and Rome, "political theology" referred to state religion, often
considered the most important type of religion since the purpose of the
state was to worship God.38 In the age of Enlightenment "political
theology" existed as a form of civil religion, providing social
cohesiveness.39 But far more bothersome than the ancient state religion
or the modern civil religion was Carl Schmitt's attempt to formulate a
"political theology" as the religious foundation for Nazi Germany.40
Though Metz and Moltmann are aware of the highly ambiguous history
of this term, they have no intent or desire to formulate any such type of
"political religion." The primary purpose of their political theology is to
be critical and transformative, not functional and legitimizing. Political
theology, in the intent of these theologians, is not a theology of politics;
it is a reflection and critique of the socio-political constitution of human
life and the Christian tradition.41
In sum, the first phase of political theology can be characterized by the
critique of neo-orthodoxy through the eschatological center of Christian
faith. In this stage, political theology corrects the privatizing tendency
of neoorthodoxy by adding social history to the representation of the
human subject. But in making itself a corrective, the first stage of
political theology stumbles on its own notable internal problems. The
notion of "political" is ambiguous and vague; political theologians are
better at demanding that the political be considered rather than at
clarifying how it is to be analyzed.42 The intense emphasis on the future
as the location for meaning, truth, and value leaves little validity to
present experience. Political theology, with its privileged position in the
eschatological proviso, threatens to become purely negative dialectics,
with little transformative content. Despite the ambiguous contribution
made by its searing ideology critique, the first stage of political theology
continues the basic tendency in the paradigms of both neo-orthodox
theology and liberal theology. Theology is, as it was in both neoorthodoxy and liberalism, a theoretical reflection on the meaning of life
in light of the contemporary situation and the Christian tradition.
Liberalism explained the meaning of history as the meaning of religion;
neo-orthodoxy proclaimed that Christianity offered a meaning beyond
history; political theology moves the meaning of history to the future.
Liberalism whispered, in its religious consciousness, a weak affirmation
of progress; neo-orthodoxy heralded a personal, formless decision of
faith; political theology, in its first stage, utters an ongoing negative
ideology critique as religious praxis. Political theology has only
corrected the fashion and not the form of modern theology's agenda to
understand and give meaning to the human subject through a
reinterpretation of Christian tradition.
POLITICAL THEOLOGY: STAGE TWO
If the first phase of political theology is designated by the key word
"eschatology," then the second phase can be designated by the term
"suffering": the suffering of a God on a cross, the suffering of the dead
who shall not be forgotten, the suffering of the aged and the lonely, the
suffering of the poor, the victims, the suffering of Christians and nonChristians, and the suffering that is both history and hope. The theme of
suffering is, of course, present in the first stage of political theology.
The eschatological mission of the church places it in a position of
critique against the injustices of society so that the church, in its
criticisms of society, is already on the side of the oppressed. The
glorious resurrection of Christ occurs through his agonized suffering on
the cross. In the second stage, however, suffering does not "function" to
mediate meaning, be it a critical-social meaning for the subject in the
future or an individual-interior meaning for the subject outside of
history. Suffering "interrupts" modernity and modern theology,
demanding transformation and conversion in history. Suffering brings
forward a different subject of history; it reveals history as the history of
suffering; it identifies Christ with the history of freedom. Deepening the
critique of modernity and theology, suffering relocates anthropology,
Christianity, and theology. The themes of this second stage are
suffering, solidarity, and the praxis of theology.
Suffering, according to the political theologians, names our present
situation, existing in interrelated "circles of death" -- poverty,
institutional rule by force, racial and cultural alienation, industrial
pollution, senselessness and meaninglessness, and psychological
agony.43 The struggle for the transformation of the circles of death
replaces the existentialist decision of faith as theology's major issue. No
longer a mere corrective to neo-orthodoxy, political theology's purpose
addresses the problem of massive public suffering that lies beyond any
attempt at mere understanding -- this problem of massive public
suffering demands transformation. Suffering is the specific, sensuous
suffering of groups and individuals; it forces the central categories of
history, anthropology, and theology to be concrete. But suffering is
more than the mere addition of new categories for improved
understanding; it is the rupturing of the human subject: the revelation of
a new human subject, who in memory and hope makes a claim yet to be
realized in history.44 With this human subject, the history of freedom
becomes the history of suffering, for, as Walter Benjamin observed,
history must now be read against the grain with those who suffer.45
In focusing on suffering as a lens to interrupt and interpret
anthropology, political theology moves to a different kind of critique of
modernity The first stage was characterized by a critique of the
functional ideology of modernity. The second stage is marked by a
critique and transformation of the epistemic and genetic nature of
modern consciousness.46 The epistemic nature considers the very status
of consciousness -- the way we structure experience -- as false and
distorted. Consciousness may be false because value judgments are
presented in it as empirical facts, because it maintains that a social
phenomenon is really a natural phenomenon, or because it believes that
the interest of one particular group is the interest of the whole society.
The genetic nature of ideology critique uncovers how such false
consciousness came into being, the origin of objectifying or masking
ideologies. These problems are not, as in the first stage, simply
functional, securing the operational character of beliefs and values, but
constitutive, creating the very nature and structure of consciousness
itself. What must now be criticized is the subtle and complex nature of
consciousness, in other words, of not only the meaning but the very
constitution of the human subject.
For such a critique of modernity's human subject, the second stage of
political theology turns to those who suffer, and those who have already
suffered, in history. Suffering is understood through concrete events,
situations, and historical relations. The ultimate symbol of suffering
becomes the image of the loss of memory and thus the loss of identity.
In this second stage political theology fears, in the words of Metz, "the
silent disappearance of the subject and the death of the individual in the
anonymous compulsions and structures of a world that is constructed of
unfeeling rationality and consequently allows identity, memory and
consciousness of the human soul to become 'extinct.'"47 As this history
of suffering makes us question the very foundations of modernity, so it
makes us question the epistemic and genetic principles of human
consciousness.
This new form of ideology critique parallels the work of the Frankfurt
School of critical theory, especially the work of such persons as Max
Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, Herbert Marcuse, and Walter
Benjamin.48 In its early years at the Institute for Social Research, the
Frankfurt School continued the basic thrust of the German Idealist
tradition by discovering ways in which reason could be critically
realized in society The Frankfurt School contributed no formal method,
denying any attempt to arrive at a generalized view of freedom, history,
and reason. Theodor Adorno's Negative Dialectics exemplifies the
position of the early Frankfurt School; in this book, critical theory as
nonidentity thinking moves in the distance between the object and the
concept, the material world and the idea.49
As in the Frankfurt School, political theology reflects on the very nature
and structure of Western consciousness -- a consciousness that must be
criticized and transformed in order to stop the rampage of history called
"modernity." As a reflective theory, political theology seeks to serve the
emancipatory interest of humanity, as this interest is represented by
those who suffer history. With its attention to suffering, political
theology creates a reflective theory for emancipation and enlightenment
modeled after neither the natural sciences nor the hermeneutical
disciplines. Hence political theology continues the anthropocentric turn
of modernity through a radically different anthropology of the human
subject, a new interpretation of Christianity, and a reformation in the
very nature of theology itself.
As suffering reveals the distortions of anthropology, so it provides the
constructive reformulation of anthropology and Christianity through
solidarity with those who suffer. Solidarity is the most fundamental
category of anthropology both ontologically, in terms of the underlying
structures of being, and ontically, in terms of actual sensuous being.
Solidarity implies not only that our lives are intertwined with the living,
but also that we are intrinsically connected to the dead. Intersubjectivity
is the primary character of individual life and life as a whole; there are
no purely individual categories for meaning, for freedom, or even for
reason. Solidarity is the basis for pluralism, relativism, and ideology
critique but through a praxis of dialogue, discernment, and action.
Solidarity is mediated through memory and hope; the radical
eschatology of the first stage becomes incarnate, in the second stage,
through the dangerous memory of Christ. Political theology claims that,
through its own dangerous memory of suffering, Christianity is the
representation of human subjects in the history of suffering. The cross
of Christ, for Moltmann, reveals the nature of freedom to be a solidarity
with the past and an anticipation of the future.50 God is not an abstract
correlate for trust in existence; God is not merely an inescapable

mystery beyond the horizons of thought. God is the liberator of history,
choosing to be on the side of the oppressed, on the side of those who
suffer history. The solidarity of human history and of Christian witness
finds its ultimate referent in God's solidarity with the despised of the
earth.
This solidarity with those who suffer is the gift of grace and,
correlatively, the nature and role of Christian witness. Far beyond any
easy religious consciousness reflective of historical process or any
radical encounter with a totally other God, Christian experience is now a
praxis of solidarity with those who suffer. In the first phase of political
theology, Christian witness existed as a purely negative critique of the
society Now, in its second phase, Christianity is a "messianic" religion,
testifying to the realization of a new human subject in history and
proclaiming a new reformation in the church.51 This messianic religion
is a concrete praxis, not merely a belief system or an existential
decision, but a concrete form of discipleship in imitation of Christ.52
Christian witness takes sides, makes commitments, and works for
liberation. In solidarity with those who suffer, Christian witness
interrupts history -- rupturing the structure of consciousness, the
systems of oppression, and the massive denials of human hope.
In this second stage, therefore, political theology is itself a form of
praxis. More correctly stated, political theology is a reflective element
in the larger context of Christian praxis. Political theology articulates
the Christian witness through the dangerous memories of Christ and
those who suffer; it interprets these dangerous memories as providing a
basis for critique and a vision of transformation. Such memories break
into our unquestioning acceptance of the way things are and call our
lives into question. Such memories provide the basis for critical reason,
a basis reflected in the form of the iconoclasm of the cross (Moltmann)
or dogmas as dangerous memories (Metz). Indeed, eschatology is now
disclosed through memory as the freedom yet to be realized -- a
freedom that criticizes every oppressive form of societal praxis but also
illuminates possible ways of transformation.
The dangerous memories of the Christian faith are expressed in the form
of narratives. Metz claims that theology articulates the dangerous
memories of the Christian faith and, hence, has essentially a narrative
structure. The primary task of theology is telling, interpreting, and
understanding the narratives that constitute Christianity Metz does not
want to exclude the role of theoretical argument in theology; theory has

a secondary value, that of protecting, explaining, and criticizing the
narratives of Christian praxis. Thus the nature of political theology, as a
theology, seems quite different from other forms of theology. Political
theology is not a correlation of abstract meanings taken from theoretical
explanations; it is not a verification or falsification about specific
linguistic claims. Political theology may include these tasks as
secondary arguments, but it is first and foremost a reflective method
interpreting narratives and recalling memories for the sake of human
freedom. If it can be called a "theory," it is a practical theory of
freedom, based on the anticipatory freedom of the human subject
seeking identity through memory and hope in human history.
Yet even in this radical reformulation -- in the shift from a theoretical
mediation of subject and tradition to a practical formation of subject and
tradition -- political theology inherits the agenda of modern theology.
For the agenda of modern theology represents the freedom of the human
subject as a Christian fact, be it the liberal freedom of escaping the
myths of tradition to be engaged in the progress of historical forces or
the neo-orthodox freedom of shrugging off the myths to arrive at an
encounter with God. Political theology also focuses on this special
aspect of human life as the contact point with Christianity, though now
it is the freedom of suffering and the freedom to suffer. In this joining of
freedom and Christianity, modern theology reinterprets the tradition, a
reinterpretation, so the theologians claim, demanded by the tradition
itself. Political theology thus follows its predecessors in good stead
when it offers a "new way of Christianity," demanded, of course, by the
dangerous memory of Christ. But political theology radically departs
from modern theology in the mediational role of theology; political
theologians believe that in order to mediate existence and tradition,
existence and tradition must be transformed. Understanding gives way
to rupture; interpretation gives way to revolution; the point of theology
is formation, transformation, conversion, change.
Be it the interruption of those inside or the revolution of those outside,
the contexts of Latin American liberation theology and German political
theology point to a radical change and rupture in the context and process
of theology. Indeed, the testimonies recorded thus far suggest far more
than a theological reorientation; they demonstrate a radical shift in the
understanding of human existence and in the very experiencing of
Christian faith. To explore the claims of radical change and rupture, to
continue the journey with the poor and with those who suffer, and to
trace further the discontinuity/continuity of modern theology, we must

turn to representative figures in liberation theology.
NOTES:
1. Alfredo Fierro, The Militant Gospel, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll,
N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1977), pp. 3-47.
2. For a good introduction to the broad and diverse historical period
called "modernity," see Franklin L. Baumer, Modern European
Thought: Continuity and Change in Ideas, 1600-1950 (New York:
Macmillan, 1977).
3. Johann Baptist Metz, Theology of the World, trans. William GlenDoepel (New York: Seabury Press, 1969), p. 57.
4. Ernst Troeltsch Gesammelte Schriften, 2 vols. (Tubingen: J. C. Mohr,
1913), 2:729-53; see also Van. A. Harvey, The Historian and the
Believer: The Morality of Historical Knowledge and Christian Belief
(Philadelphia, Pa.: Westminster Press, 1966), pp. 14-15.
5. Harvey, The Historian and the Believer, pp. 102-25.
6. For a good introduction to liberal Protestantism, see Claude Welch,
Protestant Thought in the Nineteenth Century, Vol. 1, 1799-1870 (New
Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1972).
7. See the major work of the "father of modern theology," Friedrich
Schleiermacher, The Christian Faith, translation of 2nd German ed.
(Edinburgh: T & T. Clark, 1948).
8. For a good illustration of a liberal interpretation of the religion of
Jesus, see Adolph Harnack, What Is Christianity?, trans. Thomas Bailey
Saunders, 5th ed. (London: Ernest Benn, 1958).
9. Langdon Gilkey, Naming the Whirlwind: The Renewal of GodLanguage (Indianapolis, Ind.: Bobbs-Merrill, 1969), p. 76.
10. Baumer, Modern European Thought, pp. 367-515.
11. For a definition of neo-orthodox theology, see David Tracy, Blessed

Rage for Order: The New Pluralism in Theology (New York: Seabury
Press, 1979), pp. 27- 31.
12. The notion of the infinite qualitative distinction between God and
world was one of Barth's earliest contributions; see The Epistle to the
Romans, translated from 6th German ed. (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1972).
13. Rudolf Bultmann, "New Testament and Mythology," in Kerygma
and Myth, ed. H. W Bartsch, trans. R. H. Fuller (New York: Harper &
Row, 1961), pp. 1-44.
14. Karl Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduction to the
Idea of Christianity (New York: Seabury Press, 1978); for an excellent
introduction to Rahner's thought, see Anne Carr, "Theology and
Experience in the Thought of Karl Rahner," Journal of Religion 55 (July
1973): 359-76.
15. Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. G. Borden and J.
Cumming (New York: Seabury Press, 1975).
16. Michel Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the
Human Sciences (New York: Vintage/Random House, 1973), and
Language, Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews,
ed. D. F Bouchard (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1977).
17. Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theology (Notre
Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1981).
18. Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, trans. Gayatri Chakravorty
Spivak (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977), and
Writing and Difference, trans. Alan Bass (London: Routledge & Kegan
Paul, 1978).
19. One display of modernity's inner contradictions is portrayed in Max
Horkheimer and Theodor W Adorno, Dialectic of Enlightenment (New
York: Seabury Press, 1972).
20. David Tracy, Blessed Rage for Order, and The Analogical
Imagination: Christian Theology and the Culture of Pluralism (New

York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1981).
21. Steven Lukes, "Relativism: Cognitive and Moral," in his Essays in
Social Theory (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977).
22. Richard J. Bernstein, Beyond Objectivism and Relativism;
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983); Fred Dallmayr,
Polis and Praxis: Exercises in Contemporary Political Theory
(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1984).
23. Jurgen Habermas, Knowledge and Human Interests, trans. Jeremy J.
Shapiro (Boston, Mass.: Beacon Press, 1971).
24. Stanley Hauerwas, The Peaceable Kingdom: A Primer in Christian
Ethics (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1983).
25. Tracy, Analogical Imagination.
26. Harvey Cox, Religion in the Secular City: Toward a Postmodern
Theology (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984).
27. Siegfried Widenhofer, Politische Theologie (Stuttgart: Verlag W
Kohlhammer, 1976), p. 21.
28. Metz, Theology of the World, p. 109.
29. Jurgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope: On the Ground and the
Implications of a
Christian Eschatology, trans. James W Leitch (New York: Harper &
Row, 1967); and Johann Baptist Metz, "The Church and the World," in
The Word in History, ed. T. Patrick Burke (New York: Sheed & Ward,
1966), pp. 69-85.
30. See Gerhard Bauer, Christliche Hoffnung und Menschlicher
Fortschritt: die politische Theologies von J. B. Metz als theologische
Begun glung gesellschaftlicher Verantwortung des Christen (Mainz:
Matthias-Grunewald Verlag, 1976), p. 114. For a good reading of Bloch
in light of political theology, see Francis Fiorenza, "Dialectical
Theology and Hope," Heythrop Journal of Theology 9 (1968): 142-63,
384-99; 10 (1969): 26-42.

31. Adolf Lowe, "S it noch nicht P: Eine Frage an Ernst Bloch," in Ernst
Bloch zu Ehren, ed. Siegfried Unseld (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp
Verlag, 1965), pp. 135-43.
32. Ernst Bloch, Des Prinzip Hoffnung, 2 vols. (Frankfurt a. M.:
Suhrkamp Verlag, (1959).
33. Moltmann, Theology of Hope, pp. 102-12.
35. Johann Baptist Metz, "Prophetic Authority," in Religion and
Political Society, ed. and trans. Institute of Christian Thought (New
York: Harper & Row, 1974), pp. 177-209.
36. Moltmann, Theology of Hope, p. 388.
37. Claude Geffre, A New Age in Theology, trans. Robert Shillen (New
York: Paulist Press, 1974), p. 84.
38. See Francis Fiorenza, "Political Theology as Foundational
Theology," in Catholic Theological Society of America Proceedings 32
(1977): 142-77.
39. One expression of civil religion is found in Jean-Jacques Rousseau,
The Social Contract, trans. M. Cranston (New York: Penguin Books,
1968).
40. Klaus-Michel Kodalle, Politik als Macht und Mythos: Carl Schmitts
"Politische Theologies" (Stuttgart: Verlag W Kohlhammer, 1973).
41. Jurgen Moltmann, "Political Theology," Theology Today 28 (April
1971):7.
42. See Helmut Peukert, ed. Diskussion zur "Politischen Theologies"
(Mainz: Matthias Grunewald Verlag; Munich: Kaiser Verlag, 1969).
43. Jurgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the
Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology, trans. R. A. Wilson
and John Bowden (New York: Harper & Row, 1973), pp. 329-38.
44. By the notions of the interruption of the subject and the history of
freedom, Metz wants to argue the importance of the human subject
(against a thinker like Foucault); to formulate a new theological
anthropology (in light of Karl Rahner's works), to criticize theories of
emancipation (as in the work of Jurgen Habermas), and to avoid the
occlusion of suffering in a theoretical reconceptualization of God (as in
Jurgen Moltmann's theology); see Johann Baptist Metz, Faith in History
and Society: Toward a Practical Fundamental Theology, trans. David
Smith (New York: Seabury Press, 1980), pp. 123-33.
45. Walter Benjamin, Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry
Zohn (New York: Schocken Books, 1969), p. 257.
46. The distinctions between functional, genetic, and epistemic
ideologies are explained in Raymond Geuss, The Idea of a Critical
Theory: Habermas and the Frankfurt School (Cambridge, England:
Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 12-22.
47. Metz, Faith in History, p. 152.
48. For a good introduction to the Frankfurt School, see David Held,
Introduction to Critical Theory: Horkheimer to Habermas (Berkeley
and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1980).
49. Theodor W Adorno, Negative Dialectics, trans. E. B. Ashton (New
York: Seabury Press, 1979). For a good introduction to Adorno, see
Susan Buck-Morss, The Origin of Negative Dialectics: Theodor W.
Adorno, Walter Benjamin, and the Frankfurt Institute (New York: Free
Press, 1977).
50. Moltmann, Crucified God, p. 226.
51. Johann Baptist Metz, The Emergent Church: The Future of
Christianity in a Postbourgeois World, trans. Peter Mann (New York:
Crossroad Publishing Co., 1981), pp. 1-16, 48-66.
52. Johann Baptist Metz, Followers of Christ: The Religious Life and
the Church, trans. Thomas Lintier (New York: Paulist Press, 1978), pp.
39-44.
15

Chopp
Chapter 3: Gustavo Gutierrez: A

Theology for Historical Amnesia
The name most frequently associated with Latin American liberation
theology is that of the Peruvian priest and theologian Gustavo Gutierrez.
Gutierrez's now very famous A Theology of Liberation, first published
in 1971, continues to be the basic text of liberation theology both in its
challenge to modern first-world theologies as well as in its constructive
formulation of a theology for the Latin American context. In this text
and in his more recent writings, Gutierrez never wavers from one
central claim: that the irruption of the poor qualitatively changes
history, Christianity, and theology. But this change, which is a real
break and contradiction from what has previously existed, is also a
conversion; the "new event of the poor," the "new praxis of Christian
faith," and the "new way of doing theology" are, in themselves,
conversions of other events, other experiences, and other methods.
Perhaps more than any other theologian, Gutierrez testifies to the
experience of God in the journey of the poor.
Gutierrez's work illustrates the paradigm shift of liberation theology: it
offers a new understanding of human existence, a new interpretation of
Christianity, and a new form of theological reflection. Indeed, the
structure of liberation theology can be discovered by attending to
Gutierrez's three most basic claims: first, the claim that there is a new
subject of history; second, the claim that there is a new experience of
Christianity; and third, the claim that there is a new form of and purpose
for theological reflection.
Any reflection on Gutierrez's work must begin its interpretation where

he begins -- with the poor in their historical situation. The irruption of
the poor in liberating praxis, the subject matter of Gutierrez's first claim,
is the fundamental fact in Latin America, a fact demanding that history
be experienced and understood from its underside, from the destiny of
those who have been excluded from the making and interpreting of
history. Gutierrez introduces his second claim by relating liberating
praxis to a new way of being Christian, a way of faith that is a praxis of
solidarity with the poor. With both the Christian message and the
historical situation irrupted and made new, Gutierrez considers his third
claim of a new way of doing theology. In this new paradigm, theology
comes as a second act, as a form of critical reflection on Christian
praxis.
Gustavo Gutierrez has a distinct style that is itself an "irruption," a
constant counterposing of contradictions: contradictions between the
poor and the rich, between the nonperson and the person, between the
victors of history and those absent from history. Gutierrez forces the
differences, the dissimilarities, and the oppositions within experience,
Christianity, and theology to the point of rupture. To understand
Gutierrez is to follow the rhetorical repression of our experience by the
journey of the poor; for, in Gutierrez's theology, only by seeing through
the eyes of the poor -- by rupturing history along with the absent ones -can the contradictions be opened for close inspection, elaborated for
accurate understanding, and made public for social transformation.
These radical contradictions, according to Gutierrez, irrupt into the
present as possibilities for transformation in social systems, religious
practices, theological methods, and ways of being human. The rhetoric
of contradiction in Gutierrez's writing matches the distinctive
contribution of his thought; his rhetoric of liberation mandates the
paradigm shift of liberation theology.
THE POWER OF THE POOR
The most recent years of Latin America history have been characterized
by the discovery of the real-life world of the "other," of the poor and the
exploited and their compelling needs. In a social order fashioned
economically, politically, and ideologically by a few for their own
benefit, the "other side" has begun to make its voice heard. The lower
classes of the populace, forced to live on the margins of society and
oppressed since time immemorial, are beginning to speak for
themselves more and more rather than relying on intermediaries. They

have discovered themselves once again, and they now want the existing
system to take note of their disturbing presence. They are less and less
willing to be the passive objects of demagogic manipulation and social
or charitable welfare in varied disguises. They want to be the active
subjects of their own history and to forge a radically different society.1
Gustavo Gutierrez thus describes what is for him the most important
event in Latin America: the irruption of the poor in history. The poor
irrupt into the prevailing religious and theological systems to become
the question of the nonperson. They rupture history constituted as the
stream of exploits by the privileged with their memories of suffering
kept alive in the expressions of popular religion. These nonpersons, the
anonymous poor, break into the present, past, and future with their
agonizing memories, their soundless voices, and their visions of hope.2
Though the poor are anonymous and outcast, Gutierrez reminds us, they
are a people, a collective people. These people are cast-offs and refuse
as a group; they are, according to Gutierrez, the "product, or by-product
of an economic and social system fashioned by a few for their own
benefit."3 The poor are oppressed and exploited for the benefit of
"persons," the rich victors who, thus far, have made and interpreted
history. Gutierrez, relying on the contradiction between the poor and the
rich, argues that the "nonpersons," the poor, gain their identity over
against the "persons," the rich; the identity of the poor is their
nonidentity, an identity that is gained through their suffering. For
Gutierrez the contradiction between the poor and the rich is the
fundamental basis for any analysis of the human situation, a basis that
defines the terms and orders the issues for any theological reflection on
human existence. To be poor is the representative human experience;
only by standing with the poor and by focusing our interpretive lens
through the poor may we, too, adequately experience and interpret
history. The first step is taken: we stand with the poor in the underside
of history; from here we seek to understand human existence.
Gutierrez argues that the irruption of the poor means that history cannot
be reinterpreted by adding in the stories of the poor or corrected by
developing charitable social policies; rather, history must be reread and
remade from the perspective of the poor.4 But this struggle to remake
and reread history depends upon the process and interpretation of
history in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, a process Gutierrez
characterizes as "man's" attempt "to transform swiftly and in a
controlled manner the world in which he lives."5 The rupture breaks

into that which gave it birth, the transformation re-creates and converts
the chaos of the old into the possibilities of the new. In order to stand
with the poor, we must, in turn, understand the rich; in order to envision
new possibilities for the future we must look to the events and
interpretations of the past.
Now, with the poor, Gutierrez seeks to understand the massive
contradictions of the past and present through an interpretation of
modernity. Modernity, beginning in the fifteenth century with the
emergence of the experimental sciences, is formed by the intentional
manipulation and control of nature, society, and the self: "thus man
gradually takes hold of the reins of his own destiny."6 Modernity's
process of historical transformations is characterized by the dual traits
of individualism and rationalism; traits which, in modernity, are
interpreted as "natural" characteristics. Capitalism grows as the "natural
economic system" because it depends on individual interests and rights;
society develops as a social contract among free, autonomous
individuals. Knowledge, important in all the realms of modernity, is
"rational knowledge," allowing the humanistic study of humankind, the
development of technology, and the manipulation of the environment.
Modernity recognized, Gutierrez explains, that traditional religion
supported neither individualism nor rationalism; traditional religion,
concluded modernity, imposed superstitious "eternal truths" on
individuals, preventing the free use of human reason.7 In Gutierrez's
reading, though nearly all of Catholicism responded by ignoring -- as
best it was able -- the challenges of modernity, liberal Protestants
embraced modernity with an "enlightened" version of Christianity.
Gutierrez contends that liberal Protestantism, playing by the rules of
modernity, located the "religious" within the limits of individual reason.
With this embrace, Christianity affirmed modernity through its
understanding of God as the invisible force behind the modern process
of development.
But, Gutierrez argues, the process of modernity becomes successful
only through its dependency upon massive contradictions. The irruption
of the poor exposes this process as one of massive contradictions -contradictions in economics, industry, politics, and philosophy. The
industrial and economic revolutions of modernity are made possible by
the displacement of large numbers of unemployed or seasonally
employed persons. The international project of development serves the
interests of rich nations at the expense of poor countries. Philosophy, as

the reflection on human existence, selects its questions and offers its
answers in relation to the rich person, and not the poor nonperson.8 In
short, though modernity offers a new perspective and existence in
history, its success depends upon massive contradictions -contradictions that give rise to the irruption of the poor.
This reading of history through the irruption of the poor and the
contradictory process of modernity yields two fundamental categories
for Gutierrez:
(1) historical praxis and (2) liberating praxis. In these two categories is
crystallized Gutierrez's philosophy of history: history is the arena of
new ways of becoming human. Though distorted by its own massive
contradictions, historical praxis reveals the quest for a new way of being
human in history -- a way that discovers and expresses humanity's
historical nature. "In this historical praxis there is more than a new
consciousness of the meaning of economic activity and political action:
there is also a new way of being man and woman in history."9 Historical
praxis is intensified, ruptured, and transformed by the process of the
poor becoming human agents; a process Gutierrez calls "liberating
praxis."
Liberating praxis, Gutierrez's second fundamental category of historical
interpretation, is the intensification and the interruption of historical
praxis as it forces the transformation of history to be reread and remade
from the place of the poor. As a radical critique, the category of
liberating praxis entails a hermeneutics of distrust on modernity's claim
to represent all humanity. But as a conversion of the promises and
vision of modernity, liberating praxis favors a hermeneutics of
liberation in the making and shaping of history through the irruption of
the poor. In the hermeneutics of distrust, the poor are the privileged
place to examine the misuse of freedom in the demonic maturity of
modernity; in the hermeneutics of liberation, the irruption of the poor
leads to a new liberation in history.
But the existence of the poor is not fated fact; it is not neutral on the
political level or innocent of ethical implications. Poor people are
byproducts of the system under which we live and for which we are
responsible. Poor people are ones who have been shunted to the
sidelines of our socio-cultural world. Poor people are those who are
oppressed and exploited, who are deprived of the fruits of their labor
and stripped of their life and reality as human beings. Poor people are
members of the proletarian class. That is why the poverty of the poor is
not a summons to alleviate their plight with acts of generosity but rather
a compelling obligation to fashion an entirely different social order.10
What undergirds the centrality of historical praxis and liberating praxis
is Gutierrez's insistence that politics is the primary dimension for
understanding human existence. Though we can debate the liberating
praxis versus historical praxis, it is obvious that, for Gutierrez we must
begin with some interpretation of the historical situation to understand
human existence. By "politics" Gutierrez means, in the broadest sense,
the determination of human history. Under the reign of historical praxis,
politics consists of the control of the many by the freedom of the few. In
the new vision of liberating praxis, however, politics is a far more
inclusive category, open to all humans and composed of all human
activities.11 Politics, in liberating praxis, conditions the whole of life
and life as a whole; thus, for Gutierrez, politics names human existence
both in its entirety and in its multidimensional character. In one sense,
then, politics means simply historical possibility, while in a related
sense politics refers to the reality of power in which all persons
participate in the creation of history. Thus liberating praxis is political
in a universal sense as the historical condition of all life and life in its
entirety, and it is political in a more restrictive sense as the struggle for
transformation through the irruption of the poor. Be it in the dominating
oppressiveness of politics in historical praxis or in the liberating
creativity of politics in liberating praxis, human existence must be
understood through its political character.
Gutierrez thus completes his first claim about the irruption of the poor, a
claim that can be entertained only within the journey of the poor. Lest
we miss the full impact of this interpretation, we must pay close
attention to Gutierrez's language of contradiction throughout his
argument. The irruption of the poor discloses the contradictions of
modernity between the rich and the poor, between the "persons" and the
"nonpersons"; the poor present an understanding of history that
modernity conceals -- the history of the "other." Today the poor and
oppressed are calling forth memories that expose the freedom of
modernity as domination and reveal the reason of modernity as
irrational repression.12 At stake is history itself, or more explicitly, how
we experience and interpret history. Between the paradigm of historical
praxis and liberating praxis, there is no easy correlation in
understanding or any quick fix of correction. Historical praxis and
liberating praxis exist in contradiction, a contradiction that, if we follow

Gutierrez's arguments, ruptures history in the present day. And thus we
turn to Gutierrez's second claim, that in the midst of this rupture a new
experience of God is occurring, an experience of God that both irrupts
and converts Christianity.
FAITH: POVERTY, SOLIDARITY, AND PROTEST
In the midst of the poor and despised of the earth, Gutierrez experiences
God.13 According to Gutierrez, the experience and expression of
Christianity in the liberating praxis of the poor is a kairos, a special time
during which God appears in history in new ways, "in the midst of
many and varied forms of suffering something new is being born in
Latin America. This is what prompts talk of a kairos, a favorable time -a moment when the Lord knocks on the doors of the ecclesial
community that lives in Latin America and asks it to open so that he
may come and dine there (Rev. 3:20)."14 experience of God in the
liberating praxis of the poor constitutes Gutierrez's second claim and,
within the paradigm of liberation theology, leads to a formulation of a
new way of Christianity.
In a manner parallel to the contradiction between historical praxis and
liberating praxis, this experience of God with the poor intensifies,
ruptures, and transforms previous ways, or paradigms, of Christianity.
In particular, at least for Gutierrez, this new "liberating" Christianity
breaks into the New Christendom movement; it ruptures New
Christendom's political and theological distinction between the spiritual
and temporal planes by mediating the spiritual through the temporal in
the new way of liberating Christianity.15 As the misery and injustice in
Latin America became more and more apparent, persons accused the
New Christendom model of functioning as a mask for the church's
support for the status quo. Over and against the theoretical ideals and
political realities of the church in the New Christendom movement,
theologians began to reflect on the intrinsic relationship between church
and world, and Christians started demanding that the church itself be in
solidarity with the poor. As Christians participated in the struggle of the
poor they began to ask themselves the meaning of this new experience
of faith; the New Christendom movement was ruptured and transformed
by Christian action and reflection within the liberating praxis of the
poor.
As historical praxis is contradicted by liberating praxis, so the old way
of the New Christendom model is contradicted by the new way of

Christian love. What contradicts and replaces the New Christendom
movement is a journey of Christian love in solidarity with the poor.
Christian love is the active solidarity with the neighbor who is "other";
Christian love as solidarity with the poor is the religious equivalent of
the irruption of the poor in liberating praxis.16
The joining of liberating praxis and Christian love is the center of
Gutierrez's theology. For Gutierrez's first claim of a new subject in
liberating praxis, and his third claim of a new way of doing theology,
both have their identity in relation to this second claim of Christianity as
a praxis of solidarity, of love for the neighbor. Christian praxis
represents, forms, and directs liberating praxis as a new way of being
human; it demands, informs, and provides, as we shall see, a new way
of doing theology. Gutierrez's primary desire is neither to record history
nor to construct theological method; his real hope is to give a new
language for faith, a new way of talking about God from the experience
of the poor. More than anything else, Gutierrez is impelled to interpret
the new spirituality of Christian praxis, a spirituality marked both by the
gratuitousness of God and the following of Christ through a way of
solidarity with the "other," the poor. "The other is our way for reaching
God, but our relationship with God is a precondition for encounter and
true communion with the other. It is not possible to separate these two
movements, which are perhaps really only a single movement: Jesus
Christ, who is God and man, is our way to the Father but he is also our
way to recognition of others as brothers and sisters."17
Gutierrez's main task in this second dimension of his work is to interpret
the new experience of God with the poor that arises out of the
confluence of liberating praxis and Christian existence. Appropriately,
Gutierrez first turns to the Bible to search for a language to speak of this
religious experience. The Bible, according to Gutierrez, is a witness to
the Word of God made human -- the incarnation of God in human
history. The Bible reveals a process of the universalization and
internalization of the presence of God in history; God's presence is
universalized as it extends to all persons and is internalized as it
becomes incarnate in humanity18
Gutierrez contends that the universal and internal presence of God in
human relationships must, in light of the present experience of
liberating praxis, lead to a Christian praxis marked by the continual
conversion to other human beings, especially to the poor. Gutierrez
threads together a reading of the Bible with his interpretation of the

present situation: the new Christian praxis is an active appropriation of
the Bible's witness to the incarnation of God in solidarity with the poor.
What is significant in this weaving together of biblical themes and
Christian experience is the meaning of faith: faith is not merely
expressed in historical action; rather, it is constituted through historical
encounter. As Gutierrez reversed the usual location for understanding
human experience, so now does he invert the interpretation of faith into
a historical activity. To explore this new location of faith, Gutierrez
continues his reinterpretation of Christianity through three notions:
liberation and salvation; eschatology and politics; and the church as the
sacrament of God in history.
Liberation and Salvation
If faith is now itself a historical activity in the liberating praxis of the
poor, then, we must ask ourselves, in what way is this salvation?
Gutierrez contends that salvation, throughout much of the Christian
tradition, has been understood quantitatively, that is, as the numbers of
persons saved. Now, however, salvation must be understood
qualitatively, namely, as the fulfillment of humanity. Sin, once
understood as those acts impeding the attainment of spiritual salvation
in the afterlife, must now be understood as a historical reality, "an
obstacle to life's reaching the fullness we call salvation."19 For
Gutierrez, sin is the state of fundamental alienation from God and
humanity, expressing itself in oppression, poverty, and injustice.
Though sin is the basis of all alienation, it is never contained in any one
form of alienation, for, according to Gutierrez, "sin demands a radical
liberation, which in turn necessarily implies a practical liberation."20 In
relation to sin, salvation contains a radical-practical mediation as the
redemption of creation mediated through partial fulfillments in history.
Salvation is total, complete, absolute: it can never be identified or
reduced to one specific instance of fulfillment, correction, or
transformation.
Gutierrez draws upon two biblical symbols to express the language of
salvation in the new way of Christianity. The first symbol is that of the
exodus and relates creation and salvation through liberation: creation is
transformed in the liberation from slavery into freedom. The exodus
event symbolizes the nature and goal of human participation in creation:
"the liberation from Egypt, linked to and ever coinciding with creation,
adds an element of capital importance: the need and place for man's
active participation in the building of society."21 The exodus portrays

redemption as the fulfillment of creation through re-creation and as the
fulfillment of creation through transformation of concrete situations.
God's salvific work unites with God's creative work and is linked to
human participation in the transformation of history.
The second symbol expressive of Christian praxis is the symbol of
promise, revealing the dynamic character of salvation as a process, as
both "already," experienced in the present, and as "not-yet," hoped for
in the future. The Bible, Gutierrez argues, is the book of the promise:
"the promise is gradually revealed in all its universality and concrete
expression: it is already fulfilled in historical events, but not yet
completely; it incessantly projects itself into the future, creating a
permanent mobility."22 Through this symbol, faith is oriented toward
the future; God creates, liberates, and redeems in a history that is
oriented toward the future. In the symbol of promise Gutierrez brings
together God's providential activity and humanity's orientation toward
the future; in promise, eschatology and providence meet.
The symbols of promise and the exodus represent salvation as mediated
in history, thus securing history's importance as the realm of religious
and temporal activity. The exodus symbolizes the continual
transformation of history as re-creation, and promise symbolizes history
as dynamic and oriented toward the future. These two symbols provoke,
as well, the qualitative vision of salvation, that "salvation embraces all
men and whole men."23 Salvation is the fulfillment of history, of nature,
of humanity, and of the cosmos and, as such, salvation is inherently
involved in the struggle for a just society. To the question of how
salvation relates to faith as a liberating, historical activity, Gutierrez can
answer: "the work of salvation is a reality which occurs in history. The
work gives to the historical becoming of mankind its profound unity
and its deepest meaning."24
Though liberation is intrinsic to salvation, no one historical act of
liberation can ever be completely identified with the fullness of
salvation. Gutierrez relates liberating acts in history to the fullness of
salvation through what he labels the three levels of liberation: (1)
particular or political liberations, (2) the liberation of humanity
throughout history, and (3) liberation from sin into the freedom of
solidarity with humanity and God.25 These three levels of liberation
provide Gutierrez with a way to mediate the identity-in-difference
between particular events of liberation and liberating salivation.
Liberation then, by definition, entails particular events, the nature and

purpose of history, and the fullness of salvation.
The growth of the Kingdom is a process which occurs historically in
liberation, insofar as liberation means a greater fulfillment of man.
Liberation is a precondition for the new society, but this is not all it is.
While liberation is implemented in liberating historical events, it also
denounces their limitations and ambiguities, proclaims their fulfillment
and impels them effectively towards total communion. This is not an
identification. Without liberating historical events, there would be no
growth of the Kingdom. But the process of liberation will not have
conquered the very roots of oppression and the exploitation of man by
man without the coming of the Kingdom, which is above all a gift.26
In sum, the praxis of Christian faith is understood through salvation in
the ultimate sense of gift, in the historical sense of the continual
transformation of the new humanity, and in a particular sense as
liberation in concrete situations. The historical relationship of salvation
and liberation necessitates that Christian faith must live toward a future,
a future of a new way of being in history for all persons.
Eschatology and Politics
The next question might well ask how we experience faith as the
mediate relation between salvation and liberation. It should ,of course,
be clear to us by now where we experience faith -- in the journey of the
poor in liberating praxis; this question asks Gutierrez to give us a
language for speaking of the nature of this experience. Gutierrez's
answer is, on first blush, quite simple: the mediation of salvation and
liberation in history is experienced by Christians as hope. Faith,
expressed through liberation and salvation as a participation in history
toward the future, is experienced through the continual creation of new
possibilities in history. For Gutierrez hope is appropriately represented
as eschatology; in reference to eschatology, hope is experienced in
relation to the possibilities of the concrete present but also in relation to
the ultimate vision of the gospel. "The life and preaching of Jesus
postulate the unceasing search for a new kind of man in a qualitatively
different society."27 Because this hope is grounded through particular
historical situations and through an ultimate vision of history, hope
makes faith political in working for the transformations of existing
situations. The political nature of faith expresses itself in utopian
thought through the relation of present possibilities and an ultimate
vision. Characterized in its relationship to historical reality, its

verification in praxis, and its rational nature, utopia denounces the
present order and announces a new society, a new way of being. Utopia,
for Gutierrez, is the concrete imagination of political action.28 Gutierrez
draws upon the category of utopia to make the important link of faith
and political action, so that neither faith nor political action are sublated
into one another or substituted one for the other. Just as liberation and
salvation must have a relation of identity-indifference, so too must faith
and political action be joined together without being reduced to one or
the other. Only within the utopian quest can faith and political action
work together for a new humanity and a new society.
As the permanent creation of humanity, utopia is the "place of
encounter between political liberation and the communion of all men
with God."29 Within the utopian vision, human activity is in
communion with God and oriented to the new creation of humanity.
Utopia, for Gutierrez, is a human work as well as an expression of faith.
By relating Christian hope to politics through utopia, Gutierrez wants to
protect the autonomy of the political and thus to prevent any false hope
of the possibility of a Christian state. Gutierrez makes sure that
particular acts of liberation are related but not identified with salvation
and that, likewise, salvation is not understood as the sum of history's
liberating acts. Salvation and liberation, God and humanity, grace and
freedom are always related through the nature of history as the continual
quest for new ways of being human. Eschatology as hope symbolizes
the political nature of Christian faith. Thus the nature of faith is to hope,
and the goal of faith is the creation of new ways of being in history. As
politics names the basic dimension of human existence -- human
existence in its entirety and as the struggle for transformation -- so
utopia expresses faith's relation to history. Again Gutierrez provides us
with a rather radical reorientation for the experience of faith: we
experience faith in our participation in the continual quest of history,
which is, of course, a political-utopian quest.
The Church as the Sacrament of God in History
The exploration of faith as the encounter of God in the poor can be
queried from a somewhat different, ecclesiological angle: What is the
purpose of the church in this new way of Christianity? The traditional
understanding of the relationship between the church and the world,
argues Gutierrez, either subsumed the world into the church or distinctly
separated the two. But neither option is appropriate to the nature of
Christian faith, at least as that faith is reinterpreted by Gutierrez.

Vatican II, Gutierrez thinks, contributed a new notion of the church,
defining the church as a sacrament, a visible sign of God's encounter
with history. Gutierrez uses this definition of the sacramental nature of
church to argue that the church does not exist for itself but for others: by
existing for others, the church manifests the salvific activity of God in
the world. "To call the Church the 'visible sacrament of this saving
unity' (Lumen gentium, no. 9) is to define it in relation to the plan of
salvation, whose fulfillment in history the Church reveals and signifies
to men. . . . The church can be understood only in relation to the reality
which it announces to men. Its existence is not 'for itself,' but rather 'for
others."30 As a sacrament that makes visible God's grace, the church
denounces sin and announces God's love. In the present situation of
Latin America this denunciation of sin takes the form of a radical
critique of the present order: the church denounces injustice, oppression,
poverty, and all occasions of sin. But, in the midst of this denunciation,
the church announces the love of God in communion with humanity. In
the present situation of Latin America, the church does this concretely
through its commitment to liberation and its effective solidarity with the
poor. The image of the church as sacrament means that the church exists
as both means and sign of God's gratuitous activity in the liberating
history of the world.
The gratuitous activity of God in the sacrament of the church has been
experienced by Gutierrez through his own pastoral activity in basic
Christian communities. These communities exemplify the spirituality of
gratuitousness that Gutierrez attempts to give voice to in his
interpretation of Christianity. In expressing both judgment and love,
basic Christian communities rupture and transform the church in Latin
America.31 Basic Christian communities, Gutierrez argues, are an
irruption of the poor into the structure (hierarchy) and the purpose (an
institution securing salvation) of the church. Yet in this irruption they
are a conversion of the church as a sacrament, a sacrament uniting
God's work of salvation in history with faith as a praxis of solidarity
with the poor.
The church manifests God's grace through its own spirituality of
poverty: Poverty is an act of love and liberation. It has a redemptive
value. If the ultimate cause of man's exploitation and alienation is
selfishness, the deepest reason for voluntary poverty is love of neighbor.
Christian poverty has meaning only as a commitment of solidarity with
the poor, with those who suffer misery and injustice. The commitment
is to witness to the evil which has resulted from sin and is a breach of
communion. It is not a question of idealizing poverty, but rather of
taking it on as it is -- an evil -- to protest against it and to struggle to
abolish it.32
Evangelical poverty, as the new form of Christian spirituality, combines
the biblical notion of spiritual poverty as one's relationship to God with
the scandalous condition of material poverty in liberating praxis.
Through this evangelical poverty, the church manifests God's continual
incarnation in history in the journey of the poor.
Gutierrez attempts to give voice to what he experiences, hears, and lives
in the irruption of the poor in Latin America. This second claim of
Gutierrez's work continues the call for irruption and conversion -- a
breaking into that is also a transformation, a displacement that is also a
new creation. The new way of Christianity -- a way that cannot be
understood in older forms of interpretation -- represents, guides, forms,
and transforms the liberating praxis of the poor. Within this liberating
praxis, Christian faith works for concrete changes, envisions the utopia
of history, and is redeemed in the fullness of God's salvific activity. In
Gutierrez's interpretation, Christianity is a radically new way of
following Christ, of encountering God, of being the church; this new
way, as we shall see, demands a new form of theological reflection.
THEOLOGY AS THE VOICE OF THE VOICELESS
Gutierrez's first two claims, the claim for a new subject in liberating
praxis and the claim for a new experience of Christianity, lead directly
to his third claim, the claim of a new way of doing theology. As with
the first two claims, the third claim occurs as a radical break: theology
is ruptured as the poor speak of God; and through this process of
rupture, theology is converted into a critical theory of human freedom.
Within this third claim we now see the paradigm shift of liberation
expressed in the nature of theological reflection, composed of new
categories, concepts, and metaphors, and constituted through new forms
of reflection.
As historical praxis is transformed by liberating praxis, so is modern
theology transformed by liberation theology. As the praxis of solidarity
with the poor, Christian faith demands a new understanding and method
of theology, that is, a "new way of doing theology."33 Gutierrez's claim
in theology depends on and parallels his claims about the historical
situation and the present reality of Christianity. Theology is a "new

way" in its commitment to the poor, in its concern for the relationship of
power and knowledge, in its critical role within reflection and action,
and in its method of relating historical situations, utopian thought, and
redemption. Gutierrez recognizes this new way as a "Copernican turn"
in theology.34
Liberation theology is formulated, as is any theology, in relation to the
proclamation of the gospel. Hence, argues Gutierrez, Latin American
liberation theology must reflect on the proclamation of God in Latin
America; liberation theology finds its questions, its issues, and certainly
its language, in the encounter of God through solidarity with the poor.
For the poor this proclamation of the gospel is an experience of God's
grace as the demand for justice, equality, and freedom. As such, the
uniqueness of Latin American liberation theology must be understood in
contradiction to what Gutierrez calls "progressivist theology."
The difference between liberation theology and progressivist theology,
according to Gutierrez, is not only a theoretical disagreement, but a
political contradiction, involving the social location and historical
purpose of theology. In Gutierrez's words, "the yawning chasm that
divides these two theological perspectives, that of progressivist theology
and that of liberation theology, mirrors a rift in the real world, where
persons live and die -- not in the world of ideas."35 As a theoretical
response to the concerns of the Enlightenment, progressivist theology
asked the question of reason and belief: How could a modern person
"believe" in traditional religion and still have the free use of individual
reason? Relying upon critical reason to reinterpret and reform
Christianity, progressivist theology explored the notion of a religious
dimension within individual existence. This religious dimension
allowed, progressivist theology maintained, an ultimate or existential
meaning in human life; progressivist theology guaranteed this
dimension through a special relationship to God as the giver of ultimate
meaning. Schleiermacher led the way for this liberal theology by
"demonstrating the essential religious dimension of every human
being."36 Struggling for its own survival in the modern world,
progressivist theology accepted the limits of the modern bourgeois
nonbeliever as the foundation of its own existence. At its best, Gutierrez
judges, progressivist theology incorporated the critical reason of the
Enlightenment to interpret Christianity. At its worst, progressivist
theology reduced Christianity to an abstract "essence" that formally
correlated with what every person has by nature, a religious dimension.
And so, concludes Gutierrez, progressivist theology became prone to

"generic affirmations and a false universalism."37
Liberation theology, based in the joining of liberating praxis and
Christian praxis, has a different concern and subject than those of
progressivist theology. Progressivist theology contemplated how one
could be a mature believer; liberation theology works for the historical
possibilities of becoming a person.38 Liberation theology begins not
with the secularity of the first world but, rather, with the oppression of
the third world. Against the reduction of Christianity to a formal
representation of the religious dimension, liberation theology formulates
faith as a praxis of solidarity with the poor.
If Christian faith is a praxis of solidarity with the poor, then theology is,
for Gutierrez, a way of understanding this experience and expression of
faith. Gutierrez favors the classical definition of theology as faith
seeking understanding: to think, to understand, to interpret is but a part
of the Christian journey. In Gutierrez's words:
Theology, in this context, will be a critical reflection on the historical
praxis when confronted with the Word of the Lord lived and accepted in
faith; this faith comes to us through multiple and, at times, ambiguous
historical mediations which we make and discover every day. Theology
will be a reflection in and on faith as a liberating praxis. The
understanding of faith will proceed from an option and a commitment.
This understanding will start with a real and effective solidarity with
discriminated races, despised cultures, and exploited classes and from
their very world and atmosphere. This reflection starts from a
commitment to create a just, fraternal society, and must contribute to
make it more meaningful, radical, and universal. This theological
process becomes truth when it is embodied in the process of
liberation.39
But, of course, theology takes on quite a new location when faith exists
as a praxis of solidarity with the poor; this theology will live in a world
of violence and hope, reflection and action, spirituality and politics.
From the location of theology in faith's praxis of solidarity with the
poor, there are, for Gutierrez, two important insights of liberation
theology. The first is that liberation theology is a critical reflection and
as such is a second act; it follows commitment and involvement in
Christian praxis. The second insight of liberation theology is the
privileged option for the poor. These two insights comprise the sum
total of Gutierrez's rupture and conversion of theology; together these

two insights allow a new nature of and purpose for theological
reflection.40
The first and more formal insight concerns the nature of theology as a
"critical reflection." Gutierrez boldly asserts that theology is not prior to
faith or outside faith, but within faith; as critical reflection, theology is
an act of faith.41 The critical reflection of and on faith is thus a
continual process of analysis, explanation, conversation, and
understanding. Theology is never a final, finished statement, but always
a provisional and ongoing process because of its situated perspective in
history and because of its limited nature as a knowledge of God.
Theology as critical reflection mandates, for Gutierrez, that theology is
itself part of liberating praxis, contributing to the rupture and conversion
of history.
The nature of this critical reflection has what Gutierrez calls a
"practical" character; knowledge is not ahistorical, abstract, or technical
but "practical," grounded in concrete history with the norms, values, and
traditions of human communities.42 Practical knowledge grows out of
the memories, desires, and hopes of community -- knowledge recalls
and remembers, it understands and projects. As a practical knowledge,
critical reflection has a long history in figures such as Aristotle, Marx,
Augustine, and Ignatius of Loyola; in all these figures, as in Gutierrez,
knowledge is an intrinsic part of how humans make history.
Both as critical reflection and as practical knowledge, theology has
particular functions within the Christian community. Functioning to
mediate salvation as the meaning and depth of the human project,
theology helps to form the relationship between Christian faith and the
liberating activity. Theology as critical reflection relies upon the
resources of the social sciences and of Christian tradition to aid
Christian praxis, bringing together an analysis of the situation and the
resources of the tradition to guide pastoral activity. Theology as "critical
reflection" has three identifiable tasks for Gutierrez: (1) it is the theory
of a definite praxis (related to particular situations), (2) it is a critique of
church and society in light of the Word of God, and (3) it is the
projection of future possibilities related to the present situation. Thus
theology includes moments of analysis, appropriation, interpretation,
imagination, and transformation. Theology interprets, interrupts, and
transforms. Criticizing systems of oppression and injustice, it proclaims
the Word of God through specific strategies of change, models of
transformation, and projections of new possibilities.

Theology as a form of critical reflection is a practical knowledge within
a concrete historical situation; it is essentially open, open to change, to
rupture, and even to conversion and transformation. Theology is an
ongoing process of reflection, dialoguing with contemporary categories,
reformulating concepts in light of the situation and the Christian
message, addressing new and changing situations. But theology has a
nonreducible character in relation to the community's place within the
larger political system and within the community's own history and
structure -- theology does not simply repeat political ideology or
dogmatic teachings. In one of his rare points of formal theological
method, Gutierrez maintains that theology must always use the forms of
current rationality in any given historical period to reflect on Christian
praxis.43
Theology's incarnation through current forms of rationality includes, in
the contemporary period, its dialogue with Marxism, just as in earlier
times theology's incarnation conversed with Aristotelian philosophy.
But liberation theology is always a critical partner in this dialogue,
criticizing and revising Marxist concepts in light of Christian tradition.
Gutierrez demands that theology never simply adopt the categories of
any current period, but always criticize, appropriate, reject, and
transform the categories of current reflection in light of Christian
tradition and Christian praxis. Thus, for instance, liberation theology
must be critical of Marx's affirmation of the revolution of the proletariat
as the fulfillment of the future. The fulfillment of the future, in
liberation theology, ultimately lies in the redemption of history by God.
But liberation theology can and must relate its option for the poor with
Marx's emphasis on class conflict in the analysis of the present situation
in Latin America. Gutierrez seems, at times, to abuse this criterion by
adopting rather than critically adapting Marxist categories. Indeed, the
inevitability of class conflict, a Marxist concept, sometimes threatens to
overtake Gutierrez's notion of the privileged option for the poor.44
Internal to Gutierrez's own theological method, however, is the demand
that categories, concepts, and methods of reflection must be critically
appropriated, in light of Christian tradition and praxis, into theology.
Gutierrez expands the nature of theology as critical reflection and
practical knowledge by suggesting that theology is continually remade
in terms of its own truth. Theology does not prove eternal truths that are
to be applied subsequently to history; it does not merely reflect on
existential truth that is poetically disclosed through history. Rather,

liberation theology helps create truth, it determines truth, for
"theological reasoning is uttered upon a truth that is a way, upon a Word
who has pitched his tent in the midst of history."45 Thus truth, for this
theologian, may be judged only in light of the possibilities for human
fulfillment in history. There is, of course, a danger in Gutierrez's
pragmatic approach to truth; truth may be reduced to the success of a
revolutionary project.46 If truth is, in this manner, identified with the
historical success of a particular project, Gutierrez will deny the mediate
relation between liberation and salvation that he has carefully
established. According to the mediate relation of liberation and
salvation, truth must have different criteria depending on the level of
liberation, for "truth" is itself historical. In Gutierrez's first level of
liberation -- changes in particular situations -- the truth of theology
involves the adequacy of both analysis and strategy for change. In the
second level of liberation as the historical project of humanity, truth is
mediated in the relationship between a particular situation and an
ultimate religious vision through a critical theory of emancipation and
through models of transformation. In the third level of liberation as faith
in total redemption, truth is disclosed through the mutually critical
appropriation of religious tradition and present experience. Truth is not
purified in objectivism, but neither is it reduced to mere relativism; truth
judges and is judged through its own participation in history. Though
Gutierrez himself sometimes appears to sublate truth into the success of
a revolutionary project, the truth of theology, based on Gutierrez's own
theological criteria, must be judged in the process of determining,
deciding, discerning, and speaking of God in the historical situation.
Gutierrez's second insight about the nature of theological reflection is
his insistence on what he calls "the privileged option for the poor."
Gutierrez demands that theology must necessarily choose a particular
position of solidarity with the poor based on the experience and
expression of faith in liberating praxis. Gutierrez establishes the option
for the poor in liberation theology through three interdependent routes.
First, he analyzes the rupture and transformation of historical praxis by
liberating praxis, an analysis that argues the practical necessity of the
preference for the poor and the critical imperative of ideology critique
in liberating praxis. Second, he interprets the Christian tradition as an
"analogy of love" through which God and humanity join in communion
through a praxis of solidarity with the poor. The poor are the addressees
and the bearers of the gospel, privileged not because of human choice,
but because of God's choice. Third, the nonperson, according to
Gutierrez, represents the project of humanity -- the quest for the new in
self, society, and history. The poor represent universal solidarity with all
of humanity in the historical project of the quest for new ways of
becoming human. To be in solidarity with the poor is not an option to
be particular, but an option to be universal.
The option for the poor necessitates that theology is itself an active form
of solidarity with the poor. If theology is the language of God, then
based on Gutierrez's option for the poor, theology can authentically
speak of God only as it is with and of the poor. In this way, theology as
a form of solidarity helps the poor to understand their faith, as Gutierrez
has observed: "even the poor have a right to think. The right to think is a
corollary of the human right to be, and to assert the right to think is only
to assert the right to exist."47 The witness of poverty in Christian praxis
is expressed through the purpose of theology to let the poor speak. In
this manner, theology retrieves its classical definition of faith seeking
understanding. Faith is the praxis of solidarity with the poor;
understanding is a practical and critical reflection bringing to awareness
the consciousness of the poor, criticizing oppressive systems, and
guiding action for transformation. The poor "reclaim their faith" from
systems that make them poor and despised and from ideological
distortions that bless and secure their poverty.
It is the option for the poor that uniquely characterizes Gutierrez's
theology of liberation as a new theological paradigm. The first
characteristic, theology as critical reflection, parallels much of the
contemporary theological and philosophical conversation on the nature
of and necessity for practical reflection. Obviously its centrality may not
be dismissed: the theology of liberation will be a critical, practical
reflection, involved with guiding and interpreting praxis. But the option
for the poor suggests to us that how we experience faith and how we
interpret history may influence and even dictate the nature of our
theology. Gutierrez's methodological claim is clear: we cannot separate
the formal elements of theological method from the substantive claims
of Christian witness. The option for the poor, in the nature of
theological reflection, is therefore not first of all an ethical claim,
though of course this theological insight has ethical implications.
Rather, the option for the poor is Gutierrez's hermeneutical strategy, a
wager that we shall understand differently as we risk encountering God
in the poor. As such, the option for the poor is the methodological
parallel to the rupture of the poor in liberating praxis and the spirituality
of poverty in the new way of Christianity. This wager, with its referent
in the irruption of the poor, forces theology to be a liberating

hermeneutics, an ongoing interpretation of Christian faith as itself a
praxis of solidarity with the poor.
CONCLUSION
Through the claims for a new subject of liberating praxis, a new
Christianity, and a new way of doing theology, Gutierrez places us in a
new paradigm of liberation theology. By identifying a new subject in a
new history, he shocks us into viewing reality through a new and
different framework. At the center of this framework is a new way of
Christianity, with new interpretations, relations, and metaphors of the
experience of faith. Within this framework, Gutierrez suggests a new
process of reflection, including a new nature of and purpose for
theology. What is striking in Gutierrez's thought is the constant
interplay of the terms "contradiction," "irruption," and "new way"; these
terms indicate that Gutierrez is directing our attention to a radically
different way of experiencing and interpreting both human existence
and Christian faith. The way to which Gutierrez directs us is the way of
the poor, a way that theology must now tread.
From the underside, Gutierrez does not puzzle with the modern
theological obsession of whether or not religion has a place in the
making of history. In fact, he never questions that religion has a
purpose, but questions only the political intent of Christianity's purpose.
Gutierrez's main concern is not to demonstrate a new paradigm of
theology; his concern is to provide a language for this new experience
of history and Christianity. The interpretation of Christianity's purpose
and vision through the notions of salvation and liberation, of hope and
politics, of the church and the spirituality of poverty is a reasoned
elucidation of what Gutierrez experiences in the basic Christian
communities of Latin America. In this way Gutierrez is a practical,
systematic theologian interpreting Christian symbols, concepts, rituals,
and acts. His approach to religious language is not the "unpacking" of
theological method but the weaving together of lived experience.
His theology has methodological implications, but it is not a treatise on
method as such. Indeed, for Gutierrez theological method may well be
more the conversation and conversion that we are rather than the
specific theories of interpretation and change that we employ. As we
have indicated at several points, Gutierrez often transgresses the internal
coherence of his own theology; for example, identifying truth with
historical success in spite of the mediate relationship between liberation

and salvation. Indeed, Gutierrez's contribution does not consist of new
models or structures for theological method, though his redefinition of
the nature of theology certainly suggests some methodological
implications.
If one wants to compare Gutierrez's work in genre and selfunderstanding one might do well to locate his work neither in
theological ethics nor in theological method but, rather, to place his
writings in systematic theology with a work such as Augustine's
Confessions. The Confessions is not a work that begins or ends with
theological method; rather, it is a theological journey on the historical
path of faith. Like Augustine, Gutierrez uses theology to understand
faith traveling on its journey to God. For Gutierrez, as for Augustine,
the fundamental fact of theology is confession as first and foremost an
act of praise. Theology, for both Gutierrez and Augustine, is part of the
process of a journey to God, which is, at the same time, a process of
history, an active contemplation both in and of time.
NOTES:
1. Gustavo Gutierrez, "Liberating Praxis and Christian Faith," in
Frontiers of Theology in Latin America, ed. Rosino Gibellini, trans.
John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1974), p. 1.
2. Gustavo Gutierrez, "The Irruption of the Poor in Latin America and
the Christian Communities," in The Challenge of Basic Christian
Communities, ed. Sergio Torres and John Eagleson, trans. John Drury
(Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1981), p. 108.
3. Ibid., p. 111.
4. Gustavo Gutierrez and Richard Shaull, Liberation and Change, ed.
Ronald H. Stone (Atlanta, Ga.: John Knox Press, 1977), p. 92.
Gutierrez's claim is that the historical event of the poor forces us to
interpret history differently and to change history. Broadly speaking,
then, the claim is that events change history, that is how we understand
and reproduce history. A similar claim is made by Arthur Cohen in
relation to the Holocaust; see The Tremendum: A Theological
Interpretation of the Holocaust (New York: Crossroad Publishing Co.,
1981).
5. Gustavo Gutierrez, "Liberation, Theology, and Proclamation,"
Concilium 96 (1974): 60.
6. Gustavo Gutierrez, A Theology of liberation, ed. and trans. Sister
Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1973),
P. 29.
7. Gustavo Gutierrez, The Power of the Poor in History, trans. Robert
R. Barr (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1983), pp. 90-94, 171-85.
Gutierrez's critical interpretation of modern religion and progressivist
theology is formulated after the general interpretation of modernity's
industrial and cultural revolutions that appear in Theology of Liberation.
8. Gustavo Gutierrez, "Faith as Freedom: Solidarity with the Alienated
and Confidence in the Future," Horizons 2 (Spring 1975): 36.
9. Ibid., p. 37.
10. Gutierrez, "Liberating Praxis and Christian Faith," p. 8.
11. Gutierrez, "Faith as Freedom," p. 34. Gutierrez is using the term
"politics" in a fashion similar to the Aristotelian sense of the "polis" -the public space of human decision making. Politics is not here confined
to the operational management of the state. Gutierrez's notion of politics
is similar to Hannah Arendt's use of "political action" or "praxis" (see
Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition: A Study of the Central
Dilemmas Facing Modern Man [Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday Anchor
Books, 1959]).
12. Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation, pp. 32-33.
13. Ibid., p. 108.
14. Gustavo Gutierrez, We Drink from Our Own Wells: The Spiritual
Journey of a People, trans. Matthew J. O'Connell (Maryknoll, N.Y.:
Orbis Books; Melbourne: Dove Communications, 1984), p. 136.
16. Gutierrez, "Liberation, Theology, and Proclamation," p. 60.

17. Gutierrez, We Drink from Our Own Wells, p. 112.
19. Ibid., p. 152.
20. Ibid., p. 176.
21. Ibid., pp. 158-59.
22. Ibid., p. 161.
23. Ibid., p. 168.
24. Ibid., p. 255.
25. Ibid., pp.36-37. By distinguishing the levels of liberation, Gutierrez
can avoid the reduction of redemption to any one historical event, thus
ensuring the Christian claim of ultimate fulfillment from God and
providing a locus for a critique of any and all historical projects of
emancipation. By introducing the second level, the utopian aspirations
of history, Gutierrez secures his theology in a philosophy of history but
also provides a place for a religious experience: hope in the future and
participation in the project of history are, in Gutierrez's theology,
experiences of God. The question remains if the third level, the level of
ultimate fulfillment, functions in any way but as a negative limit to
human aspirations and revolutions.
26. Ibid., p. 177.
27. Ibid., p. 231.
28. Ibid., p. 234.
29. Ibid., p. 237. Again, the claim is quite explicit: participation in the
planning of history is a religious act -- a participation in or communion
with God. This is not to suggest that Gutierrez intends a new form of
anonymous Christianity but, rather, to indicate that Gutierrez does hold
to the nature of human, religious experience -- though his own concern
is the explication of Christian faith in the new paradigm of liberation

theology.
30. Ibid., p.260.
31. Gutierrez, "The Irruption of the Poor," pp. 116-18.
33. Gustavo Gutierrez. Linens pastorales de Ia Iglesia en America
Latina (Lima: Centro de Estudios y Publicaciones, 1976), p. 1. A
paradigm shift in theology must include this very important third claim - that there is a new way of reflection, a new procedure of interpretation,
a new orientation of knowledge, otherwise the new theology might just
be a different interpretation within an older paradigm. Method is a way
of asking questions and making interpretations. Liberation theology
claims that other forms of theological method cannot ask the questions
of massive public events of human suffering. In this text Moltmann will
demonstrate the problem of a theologian who addresses questions of
suffering but within the paradigm of a neo-orthodox theological
method.
34. Ibid., p. 1. In a presentation at the Academy of Religion, December
1984, in Chicago, Illinois, Gutierrez described liberation theology as a
new language for something very old -- talking about God. Though
Gutierrez may now shy away from claims of liberation theology as a
Copernican revolution (itself a quite "progressivist" claim), Gutierrez
insists that liberation theology is a new way of theological reflection.
35. Gutierrez, Power of the Poor in History, p. 93.
36. Ibid., p. 179. It must be noted that Gutierrez reads the liberal
theologians -- and especially Schleiermacher -- in a general manner,
attempting to discern the questions asked by liberal theology
37. Ibid., p. 213.
38. For an interesting interpretation of this point by a North American
theologian, see Schubert M. Ogden, The Point of Christology (New
39. Gutierrez and Shaull, Liberation and Change, p. 82.

40. Gutierrez, Power of the Poor in History, p. 200. The first insight,
theology as a critical reflection, deals with the formal nature of
theology, including issues of epistemology, criteria of truth and
meaning, use of other disciplines, tasks, and purposes; the second
insight covers the substantial nature of theological reflection, that is, its
relation to Christian tradition and hence its uniqueness as theological
reflection.
41. See Schubert M. Ogden, "The Concept of a Theology of Liberation:
Must a Christian Theology Today Be So Conceived?" in The Challenge
of Liberation Theology: A First World Response, ed. Brian Mahan and
L. Dale Richesin (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1981), pp. 127-40. As
Ogden argues, the difference between Gutierrez and himself is how
theology should be conceived; the differences between Ogden and
Gutierrez involve both the given tasks of theology and the nature of
what counts as "critical" reflection. Gutierrez's theology is a practical
hermeneutics using arguments in the context of interpretations; Ogden's
theology is a philosophical theology, defining and arguing the truth
status of Christian claims.
42. Gustavo Gutierrez, "Liberation Movements and Theology,"
Concilium 93 (1974): 143.
43. Gutierrez, "Liberation, Theology, and Proclamation," p.68.
Gutierrez, at least in the judgment of this author, is more interested in a
radical reorientation of theological reflection and less interested in
arguing particular points of theological method within liberation
theology.
44. Gutierrez considers the relationship of Christianity and Marxism in
a "Marxismo Christianismo" (Mexico City: Centro Critico
Universitario, 1971). Mimeographed.
46. Especially in his early work, Gutierrez sometimes indicated that
"truth" could be identified with historical success. Such claims are at
odds with Gutierrez's theological warrants of the three levels of
liberation and the three distinct tasks of theology. Certainly the truth of
history is not identifiable with any one particular event; likewise the
truth of theology as a guide to Christian praxis is not verified through

the success or failure of any one particular activity
47

Chopp
Chapter 4: Johann Baptist Metz: The

Subject of Suffering
The political theology of Johann Baptist Metz is a "theological
conversion," an attempt, within the paradigm of liberation theology, to
formulate the conditions of possibility for the human subject,
Christianity, and theology through the memory of suffering. As
Gutierrez demonstrates that modernity's "person" is developed on the
bent backs of dependent "nonpersons," so Metz reveals that this
"person" is defined by a dominating subjecthood that subjugates history
and nature. If Gutierrez proclaims the irruption of the poor in Latin
America, then Metz pleads for a conversion of bourgeois consciousness.
"The direct struggle of the poor and oppressed people there must be
matched here by a struggle and resistance against ourselves, against the
ingrained ideals of always having more, of always having to increase
our influence."1 As Gutierrez interprets faith to represent the depth and
unity of liberating praxis, so Metz reforms Christianity to represent the
claims of those who suffer and the dangerous memory of Jesus Christ.2
Metz follows a different route into the paradigm of liberation theology -the route of an internal critique of bourgeois society -- but this route is
also a call for transformation and conversion, a demand for a new way
of being and doing in history.
Metz's fundamental contribution to the paradigm shift of liberation
theology is his reformulation of anthropology and its relationship to
Christianity. Metz's work makes a formal contribution to liberation
theology by exploring the conditions of possibility for a new, social
anthropology; his work makes a material contribution by criticizing the

present reality of the bourgeois subject and finding within Christianity
the memory and hope of a new subject of freedom. Metz's work
develops in three stages as his anthropology becomes more historical
both in the formal conditions of human subjectivity and in the material
interpretation of the contemporary situation; in each stage, Christianity
accepts an increasingly active role in representing the subject. These
stages are not separate; themes appear, reappear, and are transformed.
But the distinction of three stages carves out spaces where Metz
intensifies his social anthropology and the role of Christianity in the
world. In Metz's work modern theology deconstructs itself when it takes
seriously the social conditions for the reality and identity of the free
human subject.
Metz structures each stage through a careful consideration of the
historical conditions of the human subject and the subject's relationship
to Christianity:
(a) he examines the historical consciousness of the subject, (b) he relates
the historical consciousness of the subject to God through an
interpretation of Christian symbols, and (c) he identifies the explicit
witness of Christianity. The first stage of Metz's work accepts the
world's secularity by letting the world go its own way. In the second
stage, Christianity constantly criticizes the ambiguities of the world in
light of the eschatological proviso of God. In the third stage, Metz
uncovers the distorted consciousness of the bourgeois subject and finds,
in the dangerous memory of Christ, the representation of a new subject,
the subject of suffering. Against modernity's attempt to suffocate the
subject through systems of subjugation and domination, Metz now
argues that the human as subject is located in suffering -- the suffering
of both the living and the dead. These subjects have an identity gained
through the memories of suffering, memories decisively represented in
the memory of the passion, death, and resurrection of Christ.
FREEDOM AS AUTONOMY AND FUTURE
Secularization
In the first stage of Metz's work the historical consciousness of the
modern subject is defined by secularity, the radical autonomy of human
history.3 Secularity presents Christianity with a major choice: either
Christianity ignores the situation of secularity and continues its descent
into mythology, or it accepts secularity as a challenge, "to give a

positive interpretation of this permanent and growing worldliness of the
world in light of Catholic theology."4 The recognition of this challenge
must take seriously the full autonomy of the world's freedom; it is this
challenge that Metz accepts for his work.
Metz thus begins with the assumption that history is fundamentally
secular, an assumption he calls the "worldliness of the world."
Secularization frees the world from the theopolitical control of the
church; it moves human existence from the reign of the magical and
mythical to the reality of the factual and historical. Secularization marks
the shift from a cosmocentric universe to an anthropocentric universe, in
which humanity experiences the world not as nature but as history, open
to transformation and control. Humanity works together to make history
and in this way experiences human community: "the experience of the
world and behavior in relation to it take place, rather, within the
framework of human community, and this not simply in the 'private'
sense of the I-thou relationship, but in the 'political' sense of social
togetherness."5
In the secular process of making history, humanity develops a historical
consciousness of freedom. The historical consciousness of freedom -the experience of autonomy, maturity, and responsibility in history -provides Metz with a contact point for the experience of God in the
modern world. Before
identifying this experience of God, Metz must "interpret" secularity in
light of Christian symbols. This detour into the Christian foundations of
secularity allows Metz to claim that the experience of autonomy is, in a
sense, the experience of God. In his interpretation of secularity, Metz
turns modernity on its head through the symbols of creation and
incarnation: the autonomy of modernity depends on creation; the
freedom of history continues the incarnation. First, the reality of
secularity necessitates, in Metz's opinion, that the world is a creation of
a Creator. Creation, in Metz's interpretation, expresses the distance
between God and humanity: only when God as the transcendent Creator
distances creation from Godself is there the possibility for autonomous
freedom. Second, secularity is the manifestation of the incarnation. In
the incarnation God accepted the world in Jesus Christ, and this
acceptance is the condition for the radical freedom of history in the
world.6 The incarnation is God's acceptance of the world as radically
different from Godself.
Metz's conclusion is a bold one: secularity is not opposed to God, or

God to secularity. Secularity, correctly understood, is an unthematic, or
anonymous, act of faith in history; as such, secular history is an advent
of Christ.7 Whether or not persons name their experience of secularity
as Christian, God is always present through the freedom of historical
consciousness, as Metz observes: "God is not the source concurring
with human freedom but the freedom that allows human freedom to be
in the concrete. His freedom holds sway as the liberating basis of
freedom's subjectivity. Through his previous call and urging, which can
be present to man only anonymously, as moral duty, the unconditional
dictate of conscience, etc., man is called to be his free self and
liberated."8 Continuing the gift of the incarnation in the autonomous
history of the world, Christianity does not reign over or oppose the
progress of the world; Christianity accepts the radical freedom of
historical consciousness and leaves "the world in its secularity."9
Secularity, in this first stage, is, therefore, the referent for understanding
the human subject and Christianity. The historical consciousness of the
human subject is characterized by secular freedom: the autonomy and
responsibility to make history. This secular freedom, according to Metz,
depends on the acceptance of the world by God in Jesus Christ;
secularity, in other words, continues the incarnation. The human subject
always experiences, anonymously, God through the radical freedom of
historical consciousness.
What is important about the location of the human subject in the context
of secularity is the social anthropology that Metz develops, an
anthropology characterized by corporeality, intersubjectivity, and
historical freedom. For Metz the human subject is "in the world," fully
corporeal in nature and history. Metz's human subject is characterized
by an intersubjectivity that is both social and political. Freedom is
constituted through the ongoing activity of making history. As in much
of modern theology Metz connects his anthropology to God via the
nature of human freedom; unlike most of modern theology, this freedom
is defined, even in the first stage of Metz's work, in a sociohistorical
manner, identified with the making of human history.
Yet Metz's social anthropology is connected to Christianity in only a
formal fashion, since secularity is the anonymous continuation of the
incarnation. Metz's solution to the danger of secularity (the danger of
leaving Christianity behind in history's journey toward complete
autonomy) surrenders any real content of Christian symbols by

replacing the symbol of the incarnation with the process of secularity.
The role of Christianity in this first stage is purely formal -- Christianity
silently lets the world go its way -- and thus Christianity has no real
contribution to make to the human subject or in the world. Metz has
located a social subject, but at the cost of denying any substantive
content to Christianity while uncritically blessing the progress of
Western history.
Eschatology
In the second stage of his work, Metz's analysis of the historical
situation is characterized by two factors: (1) the primacy of the future,
and (2) an increased emphasis on the ambiguities within modern history.
Metz now argues that history is oriented toward a future -- a future that
exists in a relationship of nonidentity with the present. A quality of
striving for the new (novum) marks the technological, political, and
social revolutions of the modern era. This pragmatic, future-oriented
history is constitutive of social and personal life; it is existential because
it is social. As Metz's material reading of the historical situation changes
from being characterized by secularity to being characterized by the
primacy of the future, the historical consciousness of the subject is now
oriented toward the future, and the freedom of the human subject is a
freedom to anticipate and work toward new possibilities.
Within this new interpretation of the historical situation, Metz worries
about the dangerous ambiguities of the present. Metz speaks of the
negative experience of the modern era, in which freedom, peace, and
justice are threatened. No longer lauded as an ever increasing progress,
secularity is wrenched out of the dialectic of God's acceptance. History
may be oriented toward the future but, according to Metz, it is also true
that "the danger of new wars is too close. The irrationalities of our
action in the social and political fields are too manifest. There is still
with us the possibility that 'collective darkness' will descend upon us."10
The strength of history is its orientation to the future; the problem of
history (and history now has its problems) lies in the ambiguities of the
present.
As secularity was grounded in creation and incarnation in Metz's first
stage, so now does the future orientation of history depend on God: "the
orientation of the modern era to the future and the understanding of the
world as history, which results from this orientation is based upon the
biblical belief in the promises of God."11 God is the future not just as
the telos, the inherent goal toward which history progresses, but, for
Metz, as the radically new. God's future is not-yet, a free future of God.
In the orientation toward the future, the human subject freely transcends
the self toward God; not through the autonomous freedom of secularity
but through the orientation to the radically new does the human subject
experience the lure of the future, the lure of God. As in the first stage,
the historical consciousness of freedom is grounded in God and
represented through Christian symbols.
But in this stage there is a distance between God and the freedom of the
present, a distance Metz represents by what he calls "the eschatological
proviso." This not-yet future of God allows, though it does not
necessitate, ambiguities to exist in history. The present is not the future,
the redeemed, the new; as a provisional time, history is not yet perfected
-- the time of war, irrationality, and darkness. Grounded in God, the
future relates dialectically to the present, giving Christianity the role of
criticizing those ambiguities and provisionalities that threaten the
human subject.
What motivates hope and the goal toward which it moves, in my
theological opinion, is not the still hidden man, the homo absconditus,
but the free future of God. This is an understanding of history and the
future in which the future becomes visible, not just as what has been
accomplished, what has been struggled for historically, but also as
forbearance, forgiveness, and reconciliation. This seems to me to be
decisive also in the history of humanity for the understanding of hope.
For me as a theologian, the future as a whole stands under the
eschatological proviso of God. It cannot in its totality become the
content of the social and political endeavors of the individual or of
single groups, lest it succumb to mystification or totalitarianism.12
God is the fulfillment of history and yet God is neither totally within
history nor totally apart from history, but always dialectically related to
history from the future. As the relationship of nonidentity between the
future and the present, the eschatological proviso symbolizes that the
final end or meaning of history will never be realized in any one
particular situation. The eschatological proviso relativizes all systems
and radicalizes the importance of historical activity in relation to God.13
As an explicit witness to the eschatological proviso, Christianity carries
a critical and vocal role in society; it represents the eschatological
proviso against the provisionality of all systems and structures in

society. The church exists in society, according to Metz, as an
institution of critical freedom: "the Church protects the individual man,
living here and now, from being considered exclusively as matter and
means for the building of a completely rationalized technical future."14
The church must speak on behalf of the human as subject; it must
uncover irrationality in its many diverse forms; it must refute the
ideologization of one class, race, or society.
In this second stage of Metz's work, eschatology both qualifies and
replaces the historical activity of secularity. It replaces secularity as the
formal referent for the freedom of the human subject with the
orientation to the future. But eschatology qualifies historical activity as
ambiguous. Though ambiguity is present in the first stage, only in the
second stage do the ambiguities of history pose a real threat to human
existence. The orientation toward the future and the ambiguities of the
present are answered by Christianity: the eschatological proviso grounds
the orientation toward the future and criticizes present ambiguities.
Eschatology allows the subject to experience God in the free orientation
to the future; the eschatological proviso requires the church to proclaim
God over and against the provisionalities of the present. Said
differently: the hidden God of eschatology is both anonymously
experienced in the lure of the future and thematically expressed in the
church's critique of present ambiguities.
To further Christianity's critical-eschatological role, Metz calls for a
new "political" theology. A political theology, maintains Metz, both
corrects personalist, transcendental, and existentialist theologies, and
expresses the eschatological message of Christianity in the present
historical situation. As a corrective to earlier theologies, political
theology offers a more adequate understanding of the sociopolitical
nature of the human subject. Existentialist theology claimed to address
the individual, but refused to reflect on the real historical nature of the
subject. Relegating reason and freedom to individual experience,
existentialist theology could not reflect critically on reason in society,
and hence delivered "faith up to modern ideologies in the area of
societal and political theory."15 Political theology, on the other hand,
begins with the fundamental relationship of reason and society in order
to reflect on the social conditions of the human subject. By thus
attending to human praxis, political theology addresses the human
subject both in the intrinsic orientation to the future and in the critique
of the ambiguities of history.
In this second stage, Metz uses the term "praxis" to suggest that
theology should be grounded and constituted in concrete history. As the
basis of reflection, praxis includes the following: (a) the political
conditions of freedom and knowledge (a Kantian emphasis); (b) a
philosophy of history giving rise to new forms of knowledge (a
Hegelian emphasis); and (c) the relations of interest, power, and
knowledge (a Marxist emphasis).16 Within this rather free-flowing
definition of praxis, Metz argues for the necessity of ideology critique
as intrinsic to the nature and task of theology. Theology is not a secular
ideology but a theologia negativa from the future and hence a critique
of all ideologies in the present.
To develop this second stage of his theology, Metz repeats his basic
structure of human subject, religious foundation, and Christian
expression. The human subject is, in the second stage, characterized by
an orientation toward the future and is threatened by historical
ambiguities in the present. God grounds the future orientation of the
human subject and, from God's place in the future, renders every
particular situation as provisional and in need of transformation. There
are two experiences of God: one experience is the anonymous
experience of God in the transcendence or orientation toward the future;
the other experience of God is the constant critique of the world by the
church.
The relationship of these two experiences suggests the transitional
nature of this stage of Metz's theology. In this stage Metz struggles with
two problems. The first problem expresses the cognitive challenge of
the Enlightenment: How do we understand the human subject and the
relationship of the human subject to Christ? The second problem
revolves not around understanding but around transformation, a problem
that Jon Sobrino calls the second challenge of the Enlightenment: How
do we transform history?17 Now, we might ask, how does Metz join the
first problem to the second? Metz's answer would be at the point of the
eschatological proviso; unfortunately, however, the proviso is so vague
and ambiguous as to render any relationship between an understanding
of the subject and the transformation of history nearly inexplicable. To
understand the human subject, the eschatological proviso becomes a
referent for the orientation toward the future. To change the ambiguities
of the present, the eschatological proviso criticizes everything as
provisional and calls for the radical transformation of society. But Metz
never links this critique of the present situation and the call for
transformation with his understanding of the human subject. The second

problem of the Enlightenment, for Metz, is an external problem of
society; the first problem of the Enlightenment is the internal problem of
understanding the human subject. In Metz's next stage, these two
problems will join in a radical critique of historical consciousness and
modern society. But in this stage, the vagueness of the eschatological
proviso allows the understanding of the subject to be formal and
transcendental while it forces Christianity's critique of society to be
wholly negative in content and merely functional in intent.18
Another expression of the transitional nature of this second stage is the
puzzling nature of Metz's call for a political theology. He defines this
new theology as, on the one hand, a corrective to previous theologies
and, on the other hand, an expression of the eschatological message of
Christianity. This problem might be stated in the following fashion:
once the eschatological proviso is fully proclaimed in society, one has
more than a mere "corrective" to existentialist, personalist, and
transcendentalist theologies. For the problem of such theologies, at least
according to Metz, is their inadequate understanding of the human
subject; the solution of the eschatological message demands a radical
transformation of the ambiguities in history. The solution, in a sense,
swallows the problem! As a corrective to existentialist theologies,
political theology enlarges its understanding of the human subject; as a
manifestation of the eschatological proviso, theology becomes a form of
ideology critique -- and one such ideology is, of course, existentialist
theology. As an ideology critique, therefore, political theology negates
and transforms that to which it is a corrective.
The struggle for Metz is now twofold: (1) how to relate the formal
conditions of the human subject in praxis with the material reading of
the present situation and the Christian message, and (2) how to bring the
challenge of understanding together with the challenge of
transformation. Despite the transitional nature of this second stage, Metz
opens up new possibilities for theology. In this second stage, Metz
realizes that once the historical nature of the subject is brought into the
nature of theology, theology is bound to turn to praxis for its foundation.
Furthermore, with the addition of ideology critique to theology, even
more change is promised as theology explores its new role as a radical
critic and as a critical theory of freedom. If both the nature and the task
of theology change, theology itself may soon be transformed.19
DECONSTRUCTING THE SUBJECT
The third stage of Metz's work begins with a far more critical, even
pessimistic reading of the present situation; in this reading the
understanding of the subject becomes interrupted and transformed. Metz
moves from applying a functional ideology critique (criticizing
ambiguities in a situation) to employing genetic and epistemic ideology
critiques (uncovering the distortions of principles of knowledge, belief,
and action through their origin and their operation). More importantly,
Metz's basic structure -- the consciousness of the human subject, the
relation of this subject to God, and Christianity's explicit witness in the
world -- undergoes a radical transformation, making his theology
neither a corrective to previous theologies nor a theologia negativa but a
new practical, fundamental theology of the human subject. In this stage
Metz shifts to a new paradigm of theology as he asks new questions,
formulates new categories, retrieves forgotten Christian symbols, and
finds a new goal for theological reflection.
Far from the secularity based in the Christian message, Metz argues that
a "new" subject, a rational autonomous subject, appears in the
Enlightenment.20 This subject is not, as in the past, established through
cultural traditions or political systems; this subject is determined by the
pervasive principle of exchange. The marketplace -- the primary
location for the principle of exchange -- adjudicates all norms and
values of human life by supply and demand, by replacement and
substitution. In modernity anything can be bought or sold; nothing -including values, traditions, and relationships -- can stand in the way of
the exponential consumption of the market system.
The principle of exchange proscribes the limits and foundations of the
middle-class subject. This principle determines the "public" life of the
person through production, trade, and consumption; cultural values are
marginalized by isolating them into a realm appropriately labeled as
"the private." Private values pacify the repressed needs of the subject
and thus, Metz fears, appease the critical instincts of freedom: these
"private" values must make no public demands and impose no external
necessities. Individuals, reaching the age of maturity, may "decide"
whether or not they "appreciate" art, whether or not to "believe" in God,
and whether or not to continue the ethnic and cultural traditions of their
families. Religion may be marketable, but only as it serves the human
subject in some private, remainder aspects of life such as death and guilt
outside the purview of modernity. Tradition, everyone knows, is
superstitious and irrational -- the very concept of following a tradition is
antithetical to the modern ideology of the free and autonomous use of

reason. The middle-class subject will, in sum, "subordinate everything,
including his own love of the past and of tradition, to the rules of the
exchange game."21
Within modernity, Metz contends, reason is defined solely as a
technical, calculating reason that conforms life to the laws of profit and
success. This "planning" reason results in a praxis of control over nature
and history for the interests of the principle of exchange. Reason and
freedom, the promises of modernity, combine to cement a destiny of
domination: "at the beginning of what we call the "Modern Age," the
limits of which we are now reaching with ever increasing clarity, there
unfolds -- embryonically and overlaid with many religious and cultural
symbols -- this anthropology of domination."22 Subjugation is the real
"act" of the Enlightenment freedom, an act that controls the destruction
of nature, the bureaucratization of human relationships, the
manipulation of history; an act that, according to Metz, "has long since
permeated the psychic foundations of our total sociocultural life."23 The
subject that Metz has located and represented by Christian symbols in
the first two stages now stands in danger of disappearing: "the purely
technologically and economically planned production of man's future
would seem to foreshadow the very disappearance of man as the being
who has nourished himself on the historical substance of his
freedom."24
This middle-class subject, according to Metz, lives in the context of two
forms of historical consciousness: evolutionary logic and historical
materialism. Since the second form is but a manifestation of the first, an
analysis of evolutionary logic suffices to display how modernity has
constructed the consciousness of the middle-class subject.25 Promising
emancipation through increased control over nature and history,
evolutionary logic has "evolved" into an irrational ideology suffocating
human history in a blanket of timelessness. The timelessness of
evolutionary logic stands as the symbol for the distortion of historical
consciousness in, to use the famous phrase of Horkheimer and Adorno,
the dialectic of the Enlightenment. In this consciousness of timelessness,
there is no future or past, while the present is one of time as a
continuous, empty process.26 The critical problem of this timelessness,
which becomes for Metz the central problem for theology, is how
evolution alters and even destroys the historical consciousness of the
human subject. "The modern world, with its technical civilization, is not
simply a rational universe. Its myth is evolution. The silent interest of its
rationality is the fiction of time as empty infinity, which is free of

surprises and within which everyone and everything is enclosed without
grace."27
Evolutionary consciousness -- the myth of timelessness -- is expressed
in the Enlightenment prejudice against tradition, in the functionality of
bourgeois religion, in the apathy of the middle-class subject, and in the
inability of individuals to mourn or feel guilty. This logic of evolution
with its suffocating timelessness threatens to destroy the human subject,
and with it the history of freedom. Metz has, at last, located the fully
concrete historical subject only to discover that the very conditions of
possibility -- both the formal conditions of intersubjectivity, freedom,
and corporeality as well as the material characteristics such as apathy,
the public-private distinction, and bourgeois consumerism -- threaten
the very survival of the subject. Throughout his three stages Metz has
expanded the implications of a social anthropology only to realize that
anthropology is itself being destroyed by that which gave it birth -modernity and its "quest" for freedom. Evolutionary logic, then,
replaces "real" historical consciousness, forgetting the intersubjectivity
of the human existence -- life as constituted in relation to other subjects,
with history, and with nature. In place of intersubjectivity, the
domination and subjugation of modernity makes the subject "incapable
of seeing himself and judging himself through the eyes of his
victims."28 Evolutionary logic denies corporeality, a corporeality
composed of sufferings, of memories, of hopes, as well as of desires,
longings, and needs. It smothers the passions of human life, replacing
the pains and ecstasy of time-filled existence with the control and
management of timeless reality.
The destruction of historical consciousness through evolutionary logic
results in the forgetfulness of history -- the inability to question who we
are and what we do. Auschwitz symbolizes, for Metz, modernity's
barbarity -- both the horror that Auschwitz could occur and the horror
that its occurrence could be so easily forgotten: "yet in the meantime,
has not a massive forgetfulness long since taken over? The dead of
Auschwitz should have brought upon us a total transformation; nothing
should have been allowed to remain as it was, neither among our people
nor in our churches, above all, not in the churches."29 Evolutionary
logic allows us not only to be dominating and subjugating, but to forget
our past acts for the sake of our future conquests. The problem of this
"form" of historical consciousness is that it denies history and destroys
freedom. We can, concludes Metz, no longer hope to arrive at a better
understanding of the human subject; the conditions for understanding

are themselves distorted and disrupted through the insidious myth of
evolutionary logic.
Metz directs the fires of his critique of evolutionary logic at modern
Christianity: bourgeois religion is the mirror image of evolutionary
logic. Metz's explanation of modern religion parallels the explanation of
progressive religion by Gutierrez: modern religion creates a religious
dimension that hovers within the limits of pure reason. This religious
dimension serves as a foundation for a new natural religion, a religion of
reason, that no longer needs religious authorities or superstitious beliefs.
Though supposedly a religion of "all men," Metz regards modern
Christianity as elitist because it appeals to and serves only the middleclass subject. Modern Christianity, Metz concludes, functions to support
the middle-class subject and to mollify the critical impetus of the
Christian message and the anticipatory struggles of the human subject.
The evolutionary logic of the middle-class subject is simply reflected
back in the cloudy mirror of bourgeois Christianity.
Metz's new reading of the present situation concentrates, as before, on
the historical consciousness of the human subject. But in this third stage
of Metz's development, the historical consciousness must no longer be
merely understood, but must now be radically transformed. Thus, Metz
concludes, there can be no easy corrective; the attempts to fix the
problems of modernity result in more and more control. Nor can there
simply be constant critique, for critique too easily appeases the
timelessness of evolutionary logic. The solutions of the second stage no
longer hold any hope: what is needed now is the transformation of the
subject. Only radical therapy, a revolution in consciousness, a dramatic
conversion in history can save the subject from the logic of
forgetfulness. Metz breaks into a new paradigm with this quest for a
new subject, a new way of Christianity, and a new purpose for
theological reflection.
THE SUBJECT OF SUFFERING
Metz, giving up on the middle-class subject, now turns his gaze on a
new subject -- the subject of suffering -- located in a different history of
freedom. Influenced by Walter Benjamin, Metz argues that history is
not the total sum of the actions and the interpretations of the victors but,
rather, the reality of the sufferings of human victims.30 History is not, as
the Enlightenment told us, a "natural" progression of time; the history of
suffering as the history of freedom provides a new way to understand

and interrupt the timelessness of the Enlightenment:
The substratum of history, then, is not nature as evolution or a process
without reference to the subject. The natural history of man is to some
extent the history of his suffering. . . The essential dynamics of history
consist of the memory of suffering as a negative consciousness of future
freedom and as a stimulus to overcome suffering within the framework
of that freedom. The history of freedom is therefore -- subject to the
assumed alienation of man and nature -- only possible as a history of
suffering.31
Within this different history, a new, or more correctly, a forgotten
subject is discovered -- suffering reveals the human subject as one with
a past and a future. Metz discovers that, within the iron cage of
modernity, the freedom to be a human subject is the freedom to suffer.32
For Metz, it is the memory of suffering -- the ability to remember and
the memories of suffering--that provides the possibility for the concrete
historical identity of the human subject. The freedom to suffer includes
"the freedom to suffer the suffering of others" and it includes the
freedom to become old, to contemplate, and even to die.33 To ignore
this freedom, observes Metz, is to lose the identity of the human subject,
since the freedom to suffer is also the freedom to hope -- to live in a
time-filled history recalling the past and anticipating the future.
Out of the dialectic of freedom in suffering and hope, Metz constructs
the new categories of historical consciousness: memory, narrative, and
solidarity. Memory constitutes human identity, for "identity is formed
when memories are aroused."34 The human subject is formed by
memories, which give rise to practical knowledge and concrete
anticipations. These memories constitute the human subject through
narrative, and hence reason has a practical, historical, and personal
structure. Memories are recalled in narratives, which give our lives a
timefulness, a beginning and an end, an experience of history.
Narratives form, inform, and transform individuals and communities
through traditions, shared values, and concrete solidarities. Solidarity is
the time fulness of belonging to our memories and our future, the
timefulness of suffering with and for others, the timefulness of freedom
as human intersubjectivity. Memory, narrative, and solidarity are, for
Metz, the new categories of historical consciousness.35
Metz continues the basic structure of his theology by exploring the
conditions for human consciousness as dependent upon God and

expressed in Christianity. But the foundational relationship between
God and the human subject is somewhat obscured or hidden in this
stage; Metz says only that God is a practical idea, that God is the
condition whereby the human has an identity in history. The argument
that Metz previously used -- in which the experience of freedom is an
anonymous experience of God -- no longer fits Metz's practical,
fundamental theology.36 For the former argument depended on a
decidedly transcendentalist turn -- an argument of the universal apriori
type -- which Metz has now criticized as being one more expression of
middle-class ideology, "an elitist idealistic gnoseology."37 The historical
consciousness of the suffering subject cannot have a universal,
anonymous experience of God -- this subject is grounded by concrete
memories, specific narratives, and historical events. It may be that Metz
cannot retrieve or invent a new, transformed transcendental argument;
he does suggest a more limited claim with hermeneutical backing, a
claim of God and the human subject as revealed through the Christian
tradition: "the history of biblical religion is a history of the way in
which a people and the individuals belonging to that people became
subjects in the presence of their God."38 The Christian narratives in the
Old and New Testaments, asserts Metz, all refer to the formation of the
human subject in relation to God. Metz adds that the relation of God and
the identity of the human subject might be demonstrated from the
history of religions. Yet even with these weak assertions, Metz seems
left without his usual foundational experience of God to which historical
consciousness "anonymously" or "naturally" relates. How is God a
practical idea? Do we experience God in danger, in suffering, in
freedom? Is God wholly Deus Absconditus?
On the more thematic relationship of Christianity and the subject -more specifically, how Christianity represents the freedom of the human
subject -- Metz offers a powerful and radically new interpretation of
Christianity as the identification of suffering with hope in Jesus Christ.
Through the passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ,
Christianity provides a tradition of dangerous memories -- memories of
suffering with a future orientation. Suffering functions in Christianity in
much the same way that it functions in the human subject through the
categories of memory, narrative, and solidarity.39 Against the
Enlightenment separation of freedom from tradition, Christianity
represents freedom as a tradition, a tradition of memories and hopes; as
Metz argues "knowledge of freedom, even in its critical form, or, rather,
particularly in its critical form, participates in religion as recollection."40
Freedom is no longer opposed to the tradition of Christianity but is now

dependent upon it.
Christianity represents human freedom as a definite memory; it
"declares itself as the memoria passionis, mortis et resurrectionis Jesu
Christi. At the midpoint of this faith is a specific memoria passionis, on
which is grounded the promise of future freedom for all.41 The memory
of Jesus is the memory of his resurrection by way of his crucifixion. The
resurrection-crucifixion of Jesus represents the dead, "who have a
meaning which is as of yet unrealized."42 Through this memory we
experience history as a history of the dead and of those who suffer. The
resurrection-crucifixion is a forward memory that calls us to criticize
and interrupt the present sociopolitical situation on behalf of those who
suffer. This is not a critique from a vague eschatological proviso: Jesus
Christ represents the memories of suffering as anticipatory memories
that places a claim on history; in Metz's words: "What emerges from the
memory of suffering is a knowledge of the future that does not point to
empty anticipation, but looks actively for more human ways of life in
the light of our experience of the new creation of man in Christ."43
Against the middle-class subject, Metz discloses the real subjects of
history in Suffering. Against the Enlightenment pseudo-promise of
freedom from tradition, Metz offers a freedom of tradition and
solidarity, of hope and suffering. In this freedom there are no separate
realms of public and private; the values of religion, tradition, and art all
provoke dangerous memories and future hopes. Christianity represents
the subject of suffering, as one who cannot be forgotten in history, as
one whose time is still to come. Christianity's nature and role is to
represent the full freedom of the human subject, the freedom to
remember and to hope, the freedom to make a claim on history.
The dangerous memory of Christ as the representation of the full
freedom of the human subject differentiates, for Metz, redemption from
modern theories of human emancipation. Redemption, according to
Metz, must include the whole history of human suffering, including
guilt, finitude, and death.44 Metz argue; that in many modern theories of
emancipation the subject is abstract and irrational; guilt is ignored or
projected onto scapegoats; the identity of the subject is canceled into
banality. Such attempts at perfect or complete emancipation fail, Metz
warns us, because they do not treat humanity in its full historical
identity; they do not examine the nature of human subjectivity, the
thrust of remembering and of hoping beyond any historical realization.
According to Metz, redemption is not a theory or a belief but

fundamentally a praxis of following Christ. Following Christ is not the
application of dogma or contemplation of a theory, but a way, a journey,
an imitation of Christ.45 The New Testament narratives do not impress
upon us a belief in Christ; they provoke and perform a way of following
Christ. These narratives "form" the Christian, they make the Christian
understand, experience, and imitate Christ. Christology -- the logos of
Christ -- is a practical knowledge, a praxis of following Christ.
This new praxis of following Christ, as an expression of the relationship
between redemption and the human subject, is an interruption, an
interruption of the middle-class subject, of bourgeois religion, and of
modern theology. But this interruption is, at the same time, a conversion
to a new way of being and doing in history. Unlike Metz's first two
stages, Christianity does not accept the world or prophetically critique
the world; now Christianity converts, transforms, and changes the
world. Christianity now testifies to and participates in an
anthropological revolution.
For this revolution is not, in fact, concerned with liberating us from our
poverty and misery, but rather from our wealth and our totally excessive
prosperity. It is not a liberation from what we lack, but from our
consumerism in which we are ultimately consuming our very selves. It
is not a liberation from our state of oppression, but from the
untransformed praxis of our own wishes and desires. It is not a
liberation from our powerlessness, but from our own form of
predominance. It frees us, not from the state of being dominated but
from that of dominating; not from our sufferings but from our apathy;
not from our guilt but from our innocence, or rather from that delusion
of innocence which the life of domination has long since spread through
our souls.46
The anthropological revolution centers around a new historical
consciousness of timefulness, of imminent expectation. Represented by
the notion of apocalypticism, Metz's notion of imminent expectation
becomes the antidote to evolutionary logic: if the despair of
evolutionary logic was the forgetfulness of time (the continual denial of
memory and hope) the promise of apocalypticism is the catastrophic
nature of time (the continual quest of the past and the future). Against
the evolutionary logic of timelessness, Christianity now contributes a
time of imminent expectation.
In the dangerous memories of suffering, time is lived apocalyptically -as discontinuous, as rupturing. Apocalyptic time necessitates that human
meaning is never reduced to a one-time event in the past or in the future,
or sublated into a worldview of progress. The apocalyptic consciousness
of the anthropological revolution forces history itself to be called into
question: suffering calls the future, the past, and the present into
question. As the antidote to the poison of evolutionary logic,
apocalyptic time is the placement of Metz's major concerns freedom,
subjectivity, and Christianity -- into the concrete history of suffering.47
Apocalyptic time includes freedom, subjectivity, and Christianity within
the transforming memory of suffering, a memory that displays the
religious quest: "to whom does the world belong? To whom do its
suffering and time belong?"48
With this time of imminent expectation, messianic Christianity is a
praxis of hope in solidarity; for Metz, "the faith of Christians is a praxis
in history and society that is to be understood as hope in solidarity in the
God of Jesus as a God of the living and the dead who calls all men to be
subjects in his presence.49 The centrality of the term "praxis" in this new
definition of Christianity has three implications in Metz's thought. First,
Christianity, like any other tradition, is constituted historically -- it
exists within human praxis. Second, Christianity testifies to the freedom
of the human subject not only to act, but also to suffer actively -- it is a
praxis of freedom. Third, Christianity has a specific content to its praxis
drawn from Christian tradition and lived in apocalyptic expectation -- it
is a praxis of the imitation of Christ. Christian faith is a sociohistorical
activity representing human freedom through the active imitation of
Jesus Christ.
In the first stage of Metz's work Christians imitated Christ by accepting
the world, and in the second stage they imitated Christ by criticizing the
world. Now, in the third stage of Metz's work, Christians imitate Christ
through the acceptance of suffering and through a praxis of interruption
and conversion. This praxis of imitation is not just a matter of believing
but a life of enactment, combining narrative and action in radical
discipleship. Christian faith is no longer captive to understanding the
world and letting it go its way; it is no longer isolated to criticizing the
world and pointing out God's freedom. Thus Metz arrives at a new
paradigm of Christianity: Christian faith now interrupts and transforms
the world; it manifests God's grace, which is, according to Metz, a way
of living differently.
A PRACTICAL, FUNDAMENTAL THEOLOGY

In this interruption and reformation of Christianity, theology takes on
new forms, new tasks, and new relations to Christianity. Just as
Gutierrez realized that a new way of doing theology was required given
the liberating praxis of the poor and the new way of Christianity, so
Metz deems it essential to formulate a new practical, fundamental
theology based on the praxis of Christianity and the praxis of human
suffering. Metz continues, albeit in a radically different manner, his
insistence in the second stage that theology be based in praxis. By this
insistence, Metz now intends that theology become a praxis, a practical
activity that relates to the anthropological revolution of historical
consciousness and the messianic religion of Christian witness.
In order to understand the relationship between theology and praxis we
must turn to the categories of historical consciousness and to the
enactment of these categories through Christian witness. These
categories -- solidarity, memory, and narrative -- reorient the nature and
purpose of theology. Both the foundation as well as the aim of human
life and Christian praxis, according to Metz, is captured in the phrase
"solidarity with the living and the dead." The nature of theology must be
in concurrence with this foundation and aim of life: theology is not,
therefore, a methodological reflection on a general religious dimension
in human experience, but the narration, through practical reason, of
solidarity with those who suffer.50 Solidarity, as the foundation and aim
of life and as the witness of Christianity, forms the nature and purpose
of theology.
Invoking the mystical and political nature of theology, solidarity forces
memory and narrative to be practical, social, and concrete. Theology is
mystical in its universal connectedness with the living and the dead; it is
political in its particular narrative memory. Theology is thus a praxis of
solidarity with the suffering, a praxis specifically enacting the memories
of suffering (and thus provoking the apocalyptic historical
consciousness) through the retrievals of Christian tradition and the
history of freedom. Narrative allows, in a way theory does not, for the
relationship of salvation and history. Narrative engages salvation in
theology without subordinating it or making it unhistorical.
Narrative, as the structure of theology, has two interrelated tasks for
Metz. First, it is performative and practical as it forms and informs the
human subject through dangerous memories. This is its hermeneutical

task, forming and transforming the lives of subjects through the
recollection and interpretation of the memories of suffering. Second, it
is critical insofar as these memories call into question the prevailing
sociopolitical structures.51 "It is here, however, that the idea of narrative
plays a part in hermeneutics, insofar as it determines praxis on the basis
of dangerous stories which call the social conditioning of human
activity into question and which are directed against a kind of history in
which, under certain structures and systems, the subject, who can never
be accurately calculated by anyone, is made to disappear."52
But how, we must ask, does this make theology political?53 To answer
this question we must consider the basic claim of Metz's work. Metz
claims that the human subject, Christianity, and even theology itself
must be interrupted and transformed. Indeed, Metz goes so far as to
define religion as interruption and to call for an "anthropological"
revolution and a new reformation. In both revolution and reformation,
the distortions of modernity -- subjugation, domination, timelessness -must be transformed. In a sense, then, we might argue, as Metz says,
that theology is political because it deals with an entire transformation
of all that we are and all that we know. We can turn to Metz's basic
structure to investigate how and what this political revolutionreformation will contain. If Metz claims that a transformation is needed
and that theology, minimally, contributes to this transformation, then the
new structure of theology should guide us in our transformative activity.
Here, strangely enough, "politics" becomes a decidedly vague term. For
Metz's structure allows us to transform the fundamental categories of
anthropology and Christianity but, once transformed, the categories are
not directly connected to concrete praxis. We must, Metz argues, find a
new historical consciousness of time that allows the subject to suffer.
This historical consciousness is testified to in Christianity, and through
its apocalyptic witness Christianity becomes a praxis of solidarity with
those who suffer. But though this transforms our understanding, will it
transform our history? Or, to approach the problem from the point of
Christian witness, is narrative enough to heal therapeutically the
distortions of evolutionary logic? While narratives certainly form,
inform, and even transform us, can they restructure the social system of
the first world or even the ecclesiastical structures of the church? How
do we move from a transformed consciousness to a changed world? Can
Christianity be more than a barefoot apocalyptic witness to a mew way
of doing and being? How does political theology really enter the fight of
history -- as social, economic, moral history?54
CONCLUSION
By following the development of Metz's thought through three distinct
stages, we have traveled along a route of the intensification and the
critique of modern theology. Metz begins by taking the challenge of
secularity seriously and trying to understand the human subject and
Christianity in light of this challenge. Thus Metz understands the human
subject historically -- both within a particular experience of history (a
material understanding) and as being able to experience history (a
formal understanding). And as Metz puts the subject into history,
following the anthropocentrism of the Enlightenment, his understanding
of the subject grows more and more radical. By the third stage of his
theology, Metz realizes that the historical situation is distorted and
disrupted, and that it will not be enough simply to understand the human
subject. The survival of the subject is threatened only radical conversion
can offer any hope for saving the human subject. In Metz's works, as
modern theology places the subject in history, its own understanding of
the subject -- dependent on universal, a priori ideas -- becomes
deconstructed. Theology must now live with a much more fragile
subject, a subject who realizes its freedom in the midst of concrete,
sensuous history.
As we have indicated, Metz's own conversion is perhaps not yet
complete. His brilliant material reading of the bourgeois subject and the
subject of suffering is met by a formal reading of new categories of
solidarity, memory, and narrative for historical consciousness. These
new categories, represented in Christianity, counter the timelessness of
evolutionary logic with the imminent expectation in Christian
apocalypticism. Yet the new categories of historical consciousness
suggest two problems: first, how is God related to the experience of
freedom through suffering and hope? and second, how do these
categories give rise to real social change? Perhaps the structure of
Metz's thought (a rather modern structure of theology) must be not only
interrupted, but ruptured and transformed by a far more practical
argument for the experience of God and by transformative models of
new social relations.
Metz, like Gutierrez, illustrates the paradigm shift in liberation
theology. His call for an anthropological revolution and a new
reformation in Christianity all demand a new frame of reference, a new
way of acting. The language of interruption and conversion
demonstrates, as well, that Metz has moved beyond any notion of

simply correcting the paradigm of modern theology. Within the new
paradigm of liberation theology, Metz helps us to envision a new human
subject; his genetic and epistemic ideology critique aids us in
uncovering the distortions within our categories, concepts, ways of
experiencing. Metz forces us to understand that what is needed is not
just more generosity on the part of the bourgeoisie, not just increased
production or better understanding, but a total conversion of who we are
and how we live in history.
Metz's other contribution to liberation theology, a quite significant
contribution in this writer's judgment, lies within his methodological
and material insistence on the importance of tradition. Contra to the
Enlightenment, Metz argues, human freedom rests on cultural tradition,
and new possibilities for the future arise out of the continual
reinterpretation of the past. Where modern theology once ran from
Christian tradition to become reasonable and relevant to the human
subject, Metz now urges theology to recall its tradition in order to testify
to the freedom of the human subject. While modern theology turned
classical theology on its head, Metz suggests turning modern theology
inside out. According to Metz, political theology represents the subject
through tradition, memory, spirituality, and apocalypticism. But
political theology, for Metz, recalls its tradition only through a radical
enactment of narratives, a solidarity of suffering, and a mysticalpolitical imitation of Christ.
NOTES:
1. Johann Baptist Metz, The Emergent Church, trans. Peter Mann (New
York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1981), p. 12.
2. Johann Baptist Metz, Faith in History and Society, trans. David Smith
(New York: Seabury Press, 1980), p. 111.
3. Even before his constructive work on secularization, Metz was
attempting to formulate a social anthropology. See, Roger Dick Johns,
Man in the World: The Theology of Johannes Baptist Metz (Missoula,
Mont.: Scholars Press, 1976); see also Metz, "Heidegger und das
Problem der Metaphysik," Scholastik 28 (1953): 1-22; Metz, Christliche
Anthropozentrik (Munich: Kosel Verlag, 1962); Karl Rahner, Geist in
Welt, ed. Johann Baptist Metz, 2nd ed. (Munich: Kosel Verlag, 1957);
and Rahner, Horerdes Wortes, ed. Johann Baptist Metz, 2nd ed.
(Munich: Kosel Verlag, 1963).
4. Johann Baptist Metz, Theology of the World, trans. William GlenDoepel (New York: Seabury Press, 1969), p. 13.
5. Ibid., p. 54.
6. Ibid., p. 23. For a discussion of Metz's secularization thesis in relation
to that of Friedrich Gogarten, see Charles Davis, Theology and Political
Society (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1980), pp.
36-50.
8. Johann Baptist Metz, "Freedom as a Threshold Problem between
Philosophy and Theology," Philosophy Today 10 (Winter 1966):276.
10. Ibid., p. 124.
11. Ibid., p.87.
12. Metz, in "Ernst Bloch und Georg Lukacs im Gesprach mit Irving
Fetscher, Johannes B. Metz, und Jurgen Moltmann," Neues Forum 14
(1967):841, cited in Johns, Man in the World, p. 107.
14. Ibid., pp. 117-18.
15. Ibid., p. 111.
16. Later Metz recognizes that he did not, at this stage, clearly define
the term "praxis" (see Faith in History and Society, pp. 52-53).
17. Jon Sobrino, The True Church and the Poor, trans. Matthew J.
O'Connell (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1984), p. 11.
18. Similar criticisms of Metz's position were brought out in Helmut

Peukert, ed.,
Diskussion zur "politischen Theologie" (Mainz: Matthias-Grunewald
Verlag; Munich: Kaiser Verlag, 1969); see also, Willi Oelmuller, "Zur
philosophischen Begrundung des Sittlichen und Politischen. Em Beitrag
zur 'politischen theologies,'" pp. 38-71.
19. It is only after this second stage that Metz moves to a new paradigm
of theology. Metz's work illustrates that new paradigms can be arrived
at through the intensification to the point of rupture of an old paradigm.
From his early work as a student of Rahner, Metz worked on
formulating an anthropology through the social categories of
intersubjectivity, corporeality, and freedom, until the questions of the
historical subject could no longer be asked within a transcendental
theology such as Rahner's.
20. Some critics have questioned the adequacy of Metz's definition of
the Enlightenment. As we shall see, Metz changes his definition and
evaluation of the Enlightenment greatly in this third stage. See Henri de
Lovalette, "La theologie politique de Jean Baptiste Metz," Recherches
de Sciences Religieuses 58(1970): 321-50.
21. Metz, Faith in History and Society, p. 37.
22. Metz, The Emergent Church, p. 35.
23. Ibid.
25. Ibid., p. 5. In other words, the "structures of consciousness" in East
and West are essentially the same, deriving from their common source
in the Enlightenment. Metz is not criticizing the distortions of social
structures but the more subtle, and for Metz, more basic distortions in
how we experience and understand the world. Metz's analysis of
modernity's fault is close to the Weberian emphasis within the Frankfurt
School -- the emphasis on the problem of rationalization; see Paul
Connerton, The Tragedy of Enlightenment: An Essay on the Frankfurt
School (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1980).
26. Ibid., pp. 169-70.

27. Ibid., p. 172.
29. Ibid., p. 29.
30. See Walter Benjamin, "Theses on the Philosophy of History," in
Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry Zohn (New York:
Schocken Books, 1969), pp. 253-64.
32. The image of the iron cage of modernity is taken from Max Weber's
description of the bureaucratization of Western society. See Max
Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (New York:
Scribner, 1930).
33. Metz, Faith in History and Society, pp. 91-92.
34. Ibid., pp. 66.
35. Metz's use of memory, narrative, and solidarity as constitutive of
praxis has parallels to the emphasis on freedom and solidarity in the
work of Hans-Georg Gadamer. For Gadamer, the play of understanding
is both the expression and the constitution of human freedom and
solidarity; see "What Is Practice? The Conditions of Social Reason," in
his Reason in the Age of Science, trans. Frederick G. Lawrence
(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1981), pp. 69-87.
36. See Joe Colombo, "Towards a Theology of History: An Essay on the
Critical Theory of the So-called Frankfurt School and the Theologies of
Wolfhart Pannenberg and Johann Baptist Metz" (Ph.D. dissertation,
University of Chicago, in progress).
37. Metz, Faith in History and Society, pp. 159-62. In this third stage
Metz now recognizes that a major change in theological systems is
called for; see ibid., p. 13.
38. Ibid., pp. 60-61.
39. In this stage, as in the first two, Christianity parallels the constitution
of the human subject. In the first stage, freedom was located in
secularity and grounded in Christianity; in the second stage, freedom
was related to the new and grounded in eschatology; now, in the third
stage, freedom exists in suffering and the dangerous memories of
Christian tradition.
40. Metz, "Prophetic Authority," in Religion and Political Society, ed.
and trans. Institute of Political Thought (New York: Harper & Row,
1974), pp. 188-89.
42. Ibid., p. 113.
43. Ibid., p. 112.
44. Johann Baptist Metz, "Redemption and Emancipation," trans.
Matthew Lamb and Jeanette Martin, Cross Currents 27 (Fall 1977):
327.
45. Metz, Followers of Christ, trans. Thomas Lintier (New York: Paulist
Press, 1978), p. 39.
47. For an important argument for the essential linkage between time
and narrative, see Paul Ricoeur, Time and Narrative, vol. 1, trans.
Kathleen McLaughlin and David Pellauer (Chicago, Ill.: University of
Chicago Press, 1984).
49. Ibid., p. 73.
50. Metz recognizes the radical shift in his own theology; see Faith in
History and Society, p. 79, note 3: "shortly after the first phase in the
development of a political theology, I became aware, through the work
of some of my pupils, of the practical limitations of a purely theoretical
and critical theology."
51. Theology is narrative due to its convergence with the structure of

human experience through memories and narratives and due to the
nature of Christian tradition as itself essentially narrative. For a similar
but far more developed argument, see David Tracy, The Analogical
Imagination (New York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1981).
53. John B. Cobb, Jr., Process Theology as Political Theology
(Philadelphia, Pa.: Westminster Press, 1982), pp. 13-14.
54. Metz uses the German fairytale of the hedgehogs and the hare to
argue that Christianity must enter the race of history Faith in History
and Society, pp. 163-66. My reference to running the course of history
has to do with the nature of human existence as not only narrative but
structural; humans exist not only through narratives but also through
systems.
16

Chopp
Chapter 5: Jose Miguez Bonino: The

Conversion to the World
The paradigm shift to liberation theology occurs, as Gutierrez and Metz
have demonstrated, as a break, a rupture, an upheaval in the way we
experience and understand Christianity. For both Gutierrez and Metz
this rupture also leads to a transformation: the breaking of the old leads
to the birth of the new. The process of break and transformation,
upheaval and conversion in the works of Gutierrez and Metz serves to
reinterpret history and anthropology through suffering and to relocate
Christianity and theological reflection in praxis. The next two
theologians, Jose Miguez Bonino and Jurgen Moltmann, concentrate on
particular theological issues within the new paradigm of liberation
theology. Jurgen Moltmann, considered in the following chapter,
interprets the narrative of God through the identification of hope and
suffering in the midst of the agonies of the world. Jose Miguez Bonino,
the subject of this chapter, constructs a hermeneutics of liberation once
theology "undergoes a conversion to the world."
I think the basic task not only theologically, and not only Protestant,
may be defined as need for a "conversion to the world": Latin America
is seeking the road to self-understanding and self-realization in all areas.
It is not the task of Christianity to define the ways or to direct the
process. But it is definitely its responsibility modestly to contribute to it
through a theological reflection on the meaning of life, development,
crisis, change, revelation, justice, freedom, peace, man and society -- all
the elements and structures of the situation and to do so not in the
abstract but in the living conjunction of the message and experience of

the Church and the given facts of the situation.1
Theology in Latin America, Miguez Bonino claims, is in a new position:
a position of violence and death, of revolutionary consciousness, of
reflection on praxis, of responsibility for social location. This new
position raises important questions for the interpretive activity of
theology: how does theology interpret Gods Word in this situation?
How does theology avoid simply being determined by the situation and
thus becoming one more false ideology? How does theology use the
Bible as a guide to Christian praxis? Such questions compose the nature
of theological hermeneutics -- the logos of the Theos interpreted
through Christian Scriptures and historical situations. Miguez Bonino
argues that these questions of theology must now be asked within a
sociopolitical context; the interpretations of theology are adequate an
appropriate only as they are mediated through historical situations:
"individual and interpersonal conditions and relations are shaped and
find significance in a polis, a total, organized and intentional social
formation. A meaningful Christian faith, therefore, has to be mediated
through historical and political participation." 2 Given the basic
assumptions of the priority of praxis in liberation theology, the tasks of
hermeneutics are greatly enlarged; hermeneutics now includes
interpreting text and context, incorporating ideology critique,
identifying strategies for change, and proclaiming the Word of God not
only in the midst of the world but through the activities of the Christian
community. Standing at the origin of the paradigm shift, Miguez Bonino
orients us toward a new, practical activity of hermeneutics, providing us
with guidelines and provoking Christian faith through the interplay of
the Christian Scriptures and historical situations. Within the paradigm of
liberation theology, Miguez Bonino contributes a hermeneutics of the
world and the Word. Miguez Boninos hermeneutics of world and Word
is formulated through two basic principles of interpretation. In the
formulation of each principle Miguez Bonino argues the necessity for
this type of hermeneutics -- the basis on which liberation theology
interprets world and Word -- as well as some general guidelines for
interpretation. The first principle addresses theology as a hermeneutics
of the world arguing for the importance of understanding the context of
interpretation; in Miguez Bonino s words this principle "is the
determination of the historical conditions and possibilities of our present
situation, as discovered through rational analysis." 3 An adequate
hermeneutics of the world includes matters of ideology critique and the
use of the social sciences. The second principle formulates a
hermeneutics of the Word by clarifying the demands and use of

Scripture in liberation theology this principle determines that theology is
"concerned with the reading of the direction of the biblical text,
particularly of the witness of the basic, germinal events of the faith." 4
Through the constant interplay of these two principles, liberation
theology brings together the Word and the world. The interplay of Word
and world in liberation theology can be traced through Miguez Boninos
interpretation of violence in the Latin American Context.
A HERMENEUTICS OF THE WORLD
Miguez Bonino's first hermeneutical principle formulates a foundation
for and strategy of interpretation within the social location of theology.
The hermeneutics of the world is necessary, according to Miguez
Bonino, because religion, like all other forms of human activity, lives in
the sociopolitical sphere. Due to this primary location, every theory of
interpretation must take into account the sociopolitical mediation and
constitution of religion. Miguez Boninos first principle argues for the
sociopolitical nature of theological interpretation and considers the
inclusion of ideology critique, the advocacy of a theological position,
and the use of socioscientific analysis.
Theology, according to Miguez Bonino, lives in the double reference of
text and situation. Within this double reference, theology understands
the sociopolitical constitution of human life as the full sphere of human
responsibility and freedom. If theology is to reveal the logos of the
Theos in this time and place, it must do so by addressing human
responsibility and freedom within the polis. The social location of
theology, according to Miguez Bonino, includes: (a) recognizing that
theology operates under the conditioning of the political realm with its
conflicts and its own kind of rationality; (b) incorporating socio-political
instruments and categories in our theological reflection, realizing that
the political sphere is the realm of structures, ideologies, and power; (c)
abandoning the assumption that theology can prescind from politics and
be non-temporal while at the same time taking on and articulating some
concrete option: in our case, the struggle for liberation.5
For Miguez Bonino there is no value-free statement in hermeneutics, no
purely abstract or scientific proof of the correctness of one way of life.
Rather, every interpretation involves, at least implicitly, some indication
of how it is to be a human subject in the world -- knowledge reflects and
guides praxis, praxis constitutes and is formed by knowledge. The
hermeneutics of theology are not abstract descriptions of situations;

theology reflects on that in which it participates. Since theology
elaborates, by its systematic content and its participation in story, a way
of being in the world, it cannot abstract itself from the polls, the realm
of human decision-making and community.
Interpretation theory is, for Miguez Bonino, a reflective theory, and thus
interpreters must be conscious of their class, their culture, their tradition,
and their functions in society. Relying upon arguments from the
sociology of knowledge and from a revision of Bultmanns
hermeneutics, Miguez Bonino highlights the importance of the
preunderstanding of the theologian as interpreter. The sociology of
knowledge emphasizes the shared knowledge of the interpreter;
knowledge is always socially produced and constituted. The categories,
concepts, and cognitive operations of the interpreter are social
knowledge, both in the sense of arising out of particular traditions and in
the sense of participating within a particular polis. Miguez Bonino
wants to "deepens Bultmanns theological hermeneutics by emphasizing
the preunderstanding the interpreter brings to a text, "not in the abstract
philosophical analysis of existence but in the concrete conditions of men
who belong to a certain time, people, and class, who are engaged in
certain courses of action, even of Christian action, and who reflect and
read the texts within and out of these conditions. 6 Both positions agree
that the interpreters own categories, frameworks, and methods of
reasoning depend, to a great extent, on the culture and period in which
they live. Thus, Miguez Bonino argues, every interpreter lives in a
situation that in some way supports, reflects, legitimizes, or criticizes a
certain way of being in the world. 7
In sum, the sociopolitical nature of a hermeneutics of the world depends
upon the location of theology and the theologian within praxis.
Consequently, any interpretation theory of religion must be aware of its
own social location in the political sphere; it must critically reflect on its
own position, its history, and its social interest. Given the sociopolitical
nature of interpretation theory, Miguez Bonino offers three general
guidelines for a hermeneutics of the world: (1) the inclusion of ideology
and ideology critique in theology, (2) the positioning of theology within
the social location, and (3) the use of social sciences in theology.
1) The inclusion of ideology and ideology critique in theology: The
social location of interpretation theory requires attention to the
ideological frameworks within different forms of praxis and, hence,
within theology itself. 8 Miguez Bonino employs the term "ideology" in

a much more positive sense than many liberation theologians; Miguez
Bonino defines ideology as the general worldview -- the unified picture
of reality -- within a particular praxis. 9 With this broad definition of
ideology as worldview,, Miguez Bonino argues that every interpretation
has some form of ideology as the unified elements of an understanding
of the world. The ideological nature of theology is intrinsic to the
historical character of theology. By this Miguez Bonino intends nothing
more than the relation of theology to the worldview of its situation;
ideology supplies the general content to the knowledge of a period. Yet
ideology cannot be simply assumed, for, precisely as with the
worldview of a period, it must be examined and analyzed; the
fundamental assumptions we have about our world must, in theology,
always be questioned. In Miguez Bonino s words: "any course of action
which keeps a certain coherence implies a unified perspective on reality,
an explicit or implicit project. Ideology, in this sense, has also a positive
meaning; it is the instrument through which our Christian obedience
gains coherence and unity. It is so, though, provided that it be always
brought to consciousness and critically examined both in terms of the
gospel and of the scientific analysis of reality." 10
Because theology always relates to various forms of ideology,
interpretation theory must include a strong moment of suspicion in
analyzing every ideology. 11 Ideology can be false; it can mask the real
interests and intents of power structures in society. Miguez Bonino
limits his hermeneutics to the use of a functional ideology critique that
uncovers a position used to mask the special interests of a select group
of people. Miguez Bonino suggests, for instance, that Latin American
liberation theologians must be suspicious of all theologies coming from
the first world and ask what kind of praxis the theology supports,
reflects, or legitimizes. Questions of interests, location, and commitment
reveal the effects as well as the intent of a theological position. Miguez
Bonino incorporates the role of ideology critique in theology as an
implication of the social location; ideology critique is necessary because
of the sociopolitical mediation of all of theology.
2) The positioning of theology within the social location: Theology,
according to Miguez Bonino, must reflect on its social location, for
otherwise it is merely determined by the particular class, status, and
interest of the theologian. This internal reflection on the social location
of theology provides for the possibility that theologians may "position"
their theology through a discernment of God's action in a particular
historical situation: "we are situated in reality to be sure -- historically,

geographically, culturally, and most of all groupwise and classwise -but we can also position ourselves differently in relation to the
situation." 12 Theologians, as interpreters, are not just mirror images of
particular interests, but constructive interpreters; they participate in the
situation through analysis, criticism, and interpretation. Liberation
theologians cannot argue, as did their modern predecessors, the true,
correct or transcendental position for all times and places; given Miguez
Bonino's insistence on praxis as the basis of interpretation theory,
theology has no universal vantage point for all times and places. But
liberation theologians can make practical theological interpretations
employing various forms of analysis and theories of transformation to
argue the adequacy of their position.
3) The use of social sciences in theology: The social location of
theology also requires that new categories, concepts, and other theories
from the social sciences be used in theological hermeneutics. Miguez
Bonino believes that the use of social sciences represents a new
phenomenon in theology. Since the second century, theology has relied
upon philosophical language and theoretical principles of rationality to
construct its interpretations and to argue the adequacy of theological
interpretations. The truth of theology, Miguez Bonino contends, was
traditionally located in its conceptual relationship to various
philosophies; untruth was regarded as error -- something that could be
conceptually cleared up, corrected, or reinterpreted. But now the
philosophical enterprise itself has been called into question; there is no
pure concept through which to interpret history. Indeed, philosophy has
become more praxis-oriented, using its theoretical arguments to aid in
the ongoing interpretation of human existence. It is, Miguez Bonino
argues, the interpretation of praxis that demands new categories and
concepts: Finally, both the criticism and the introduction of the criterion
of historical verifiability introduces into the hermeneutical task new
areas and instruments. We are not concerned with establishing through
deduction the consequences of conceptual truths but with analyzing a
historical praxis which claims to be Christian. This critical analysis
includes a number of operations, which are totally unknown to classical
theology. . . The area of research is the total society in which these
agents are performing; economic, political, and cultural facts are as
relevant to a knowledge of this praxis as the exegesis of their
pronouncements and publications. 13
For Miguez Bonino, once theology becomes an interpretation of praxis,
it must forge ahead with these new tools and conversation partners. For
Miguez Bonino, these social tools allow theology to analyze and
interpret the world, as philosophy allows theology to analyze and
interpret ideas. The social categories make theology concrete, both in its
ability to understand the situation and in its ability to speak to the
situation. Social categories and concepts offer new ways to translate
religious symbols and ideas. Reconciliation, for instance, when used
with oppressed groups struggling for their rights, now includes a
historical and political meaning through the uses of social categories.
In this first principle of interpretation theory -- his hermeneutics of the
world -- Miguez Bonino broadens theological hermeneutics to include
what he calls the double reference, the context of praxis as well as the
text of faith. Miguez Bonino's hermeneutics of the world depends on a
dialectical relationship between knowledge and praxis: knowledge
grows out of praxis, but is never reduced to mere action. Because of the
dialectical relationship between knowledge and praxis, the interpretation
theory of liberation theology will always be context-dependent. 14 The
specific form of interpretation theory will depend, to a certain extent,
upon the particular situation: a hermeneutics of the world might rely
heavily on economic analysis in one situation, upon ideology critique in
a second situation, and upon educational theory in a third situation. With
this turn from a universal method to context-dependent methods,
interpretation theory within the paradigm of liberation theology
becomes a form of practical reason, a deliberation of possibilities within
praxis. As practical reason, theology interprets the world always in
dialogue with the Word. 15 The faith upon which theology reflects is a
faith in God active in the world calling all Christians to follow God's
Word. Therefore any interpretation theory must consider the Word as
well as the world.
A HERMENEUTICS OF THE WORD
For faith to be located and positioned in a particular situation, theology
must not only analyze the social context, but must also attend to the
claims of the tradition, and especially to Christian Scriptures. What
Miguez Bonino ponders in his hermeneutics of the Word is a twofold
question: How is the Bible a revelation of God's activity in history? and,
How do we discern the actions of God within our own situation? This
second principle of interpretation, for Miguez Bonino, appeals to the
Scriptures as authoritative for Christian praxis by the "reading of the
direction of the biblical text, particularly of the witness of the basic,
germinal events of the faith." 16 This hermeneutical principle grounds

the historical activity of Christians through the status of the Bible as a
witness to God's action in history and includes hermeneutical guidelines
for the obedience of Christian praxis.
The sociopolitical praxis of Christianity is both demanded by as well as
guided by the Bible. This implies that Christians act in history not
simply because of their own social location, but also because of the
nature of their Christian faith. The nature of this faith, for Miguez
Bonino, portrays a God acting in history: Christians act because God
acts. Miguez Bonino develops the nature of his hermeneutics of the
Word out of his theological convictions about the agency of God in
history. The theological treatment of the Scriptures proceeds through
three steps: (1) an understanding of God's action in history, (2) an
interpretation of the relationship of the kingdom to history, and (3) the
discernment of the kingdom as the work of the church in this
intermediate time.
Because of the Bible's privileged status as a revelatory document within
Christianity, theology must always include a hermeneutics of the Word,
a reading of God's action through history as testified to in the Scriptures.
The Bible contains narrative accounts of God's action in history, which
we, according to Miguez Bonino, must interpret through analogy.
Miguez Bonino warns against the constant temptation to assume that
God acts today in history as God acted in various biblical narratives.
Indeed, the plurality of modes of God's action within the biblical
accounts makes any literal interpretation impossible. The Bible,
therefore, reveals the uniqueness of history in light of God's action. 17
History is composed of events, actions, new possibilities; history
disallows rigid norms or literal rules in the interpretation of God's
action.
From this general argument for an analogical interpretation of the
Scriptures, Miguez Bonino draws three theological observations: (1)
God acts in history for all, (2) God uses different forms, methods,
manners, and ways of acting within any one given historical time period
and throughout all history, and (3) there is a certain constancy to God's
action in history. 18 "The action of God, therefore, cannot be interpreted
as a series of examples of the same behavior, it must be interpreted in its
dynamic." 19 Interpreters must not make a distinction between earthly
and spiritual realms (for God acts only in history) and should not
attempt to draw universal principles out of the biblical witness (for God
acts in multiple ways). What is important for Miguez Bonino is that the
Bible reveals God's action in history as a dynamic process.
Though the ways and forms of God's actions may be diverse and
multiple, there is a constancy in the action of God -- the constancy of
God transforming history into the kingdom. The kingdom of God serves
as a focal referent for interpreting the diversity and the constancy of
how God acts in history. The Bible reveals the kingdom as always
related to history, a relationship that Miguez Bonino believes is often
misunderstood in theology. This theologian is especially critical of what
he calls the dualistic and monistic formulations of the relationship
between the kingdom and history. The dualistic formulation,
represented by thinkers like Augustine and Moltmann, relates the
kingdom of God to a special history of faith, distinguishing this special
history from concrete human history. Miguez Bonino argues that such
an understanding of the relationship of the kingdom of God to a special
history of faith is extremely problematic; the definition of history, in the
social location of theology, implies the interrelatedness of all activities.
Furthermore, this dualist solution denies the basic biblical thrust of
God's activity within all history, beginning with creation and concluding
with the fulfillment of the world. The monist solution, represented by
classical theologians such as Irenaeus and Origen as well as by some
contemporary liberation theologians, tends to reduce God's kingdom to
human history. 20 This position denies a distinct mission within
Christianity and mollifies any nonidentity between Christian tradition
and the cultural situation. The difficulty, Miguez Bonino observes, lies
in maintaining the importance and necessity of both the kingdom and
history in their relationship of unity-in-difference.
Miguez Bonino's solution to the difficulty is to think of the unity-indifference between the kingdom and history as similar to the Pauline
relationship of the unity-in-difference between the earthly body and the
resurrected body. This relationship between the earthly body and the
resurrected body affirms the continuity and the discontinuity of
historical life: the resurrected body is the transformation of historical
life. "The transformation does not 'disfigure' or 'denaturalize' bodily life;
instead it fulfills and perfects it, eliminating its frailty and
corruptibility." 21 The relationship between history and the kingdom can
also be understood as analogous to the Pauline conception of works. For
Paul, works receive their value not from their relationship to the present
but from their anticipation and representation of the future. The key
factor in understanding the unity-in-difference in both Pauline notions is
the future orientation -- the yet-to-be-fulfilled import -- of historical

events. History is transformed into the kingdom, and events receive
their value in light of the kingdom transforming history. The kingdom is
not the simple telos or progress of history, but neither is it a total
replacement of human history. The kingdom transforms, cures, makes
new the full corporeality of history. Miguez Bonino explains this
relationship of unity-in-difference: "thus the kingdom of God is not the
negation of history but rather the elimination of its frailty, corruptibility,
and ambiguity. Going a bit more deeply, we can say it is the elimination
of history's sinfulness so that the authentic import of communitarian life
may be realized. In the same way, then, historical 'works' take on
permanence insofar as they anticipate this full realization." 22 Miguez
Bonino' s strategy is to provide basic metaphors for avoiding the
reduction of the kingdom to history or the isolation of the kingdom to
one particular part of history. It can certainly be argued that the
metaphors of body-soul and works-faith are hardly commensurate with
that of history-kingdom. But the metaphors do serve to underline a
twofold theme of Miguez Bonino's hermeneutics:
the kingdom cannot be sublated into history, and
knowledge cannot be sublated into praxis.
Thus history, according to Miguez Bonino, is an intermediate time, and
theological hermeneutics has the task of making sense of this time of
transformation. Hermeneutics is, for Miguez Bonino, a decidedly
religious activity, the discernment of the kingdom of God in history by
the community of church. In this time of transformation, discernment is,
of course, always provisional and ambiguous. The role of the church is
to participate in this transformation, especially in the "naming and
making manifest the eschatological reality it awaits." 23
In this manner, Miguez Bonino provides the biblical foundations for an
interpretation theory that is centered in the historical appropriation of
the gospel. If in the first principle, the hermeneutics of the world,
interpretation is always a sociopolitical activity, in this second principle,
the hermeneutics of the Word, interpretation is always a religious task.
The Bible reveals God's action, and through the interpretation of the
Scriptures, Christians discern the present activity of God. The eventcharacter of the Bible provides the material for drawing analogical
comparisons between God's activity in the originary witness and God's
present activity, and demands that this analogical comparison must be
undertaken together with a hermeneutics of the Word. The analogical
interpretation theory with the paradigm of liberation theology implies

two general guidelines for interpretation: (1) the Bible must be
explained through its own particularity; (2) the Bible must be
understood through the use of biblical themes.
1) The Bible must be explained through its own particularity. We must
recall for a moment Miguez Bonino' s analysis of the Bible as a
collection of narratives about specific events that, in one manner or
another, refer to the kingdom of God transforming history. Within these
narratives, facts or principles cannot be separated from specific events;
narratives must be understood in their particular contexts and as written
texts. Miguez Bonino argues that the nature of the kerygma itself
demands the critical rereading of the text, the history of the context, and
the history of the effects of the text. All the means available -- historical
studies, literary studies, linguistic studies, sociological analyses -- are
helpful in interpreting the texts. Only by understanding the particularity
of the text, this liberation theologian argues, does the text open up for a
present reading. 24 Miguez Bonino calls this the "double location" of the
text. Though the text cannot be literally transposed onto a contemporary
situation, it can be interpreted through the particularity of its own
situation. 25 Only as we see and understand the social location of a text,
its past interpretations, and the present readings of it can we arrive at a
hermeneutical circulation "between the text in its historicity and our
own historical reading of it in obedience." 26
2) The Bible must be understood through the use of biblical themes:
Miguez Bonino's answer to the complex problem of the relationship of
biblical texts and the present situation, given the ambiguity and
provisionality of all interpretations, is through the use of biblical
themes.
When we ask ourselves if it is possible for us, in this limited and
tentative way, to glimpse the meaning of God's action in history, we can
discern a direction in the action of God apparent in the Scriptures,
namely the redemption of human life in its totality (individual and
communal, spiritual and physical, present and future). That redemption
is described in terms drawn from everyday human experience which,
although they have a special significance in their biblical context, permit
of a certain analogous projection in secular history (insofar as God's
action opens the way for, and makes possible a human action). A
projection of these terms (basically reconciliation, justice, peace,
liberation) and the biblical paradigm in which they are used, allows the
believer to orient himself in his search in and through faith, for his
course of conduct in the civita terrena. 27
The development of biblical themes is composed, for Miguez Bonino,
of three steps;
(1) relying on the fundamental "direction" or unity of the Scriptures as
the vision of the redemption of life, which is always the transformation
of history, (2) locating terms or themes that work within specific
narrated events to provide paradigms of God's action, and (3) using
these paradigms analogously within a present historical situation to
discern God's activity. Miguez Bonino's Ama y haz lo que quieras
illustrates the notion of biblical themes and paradigms; it argues for the
theme of love as the primary hermeneutical paradigm in the Bible. 28
The theme of love in the Bible revolves around Jesus as showing a new
way of being human. Jesus represents this new way of being human as a
model, as a picture of human origin and future, and as a leader of
humanity. In Jesus, as the ultimate paradigm of love, the creative and
redemptive activity of God is uniquely realized in history. Jesus
represents both the way of Christian love and the horizon of the love of
God: in Jesus, love is both gift and task.
Together these principles aid the interpreter in exploring the analogical
relationship between the Scriptures and present Christian praxis. This
analogy of interpretation, according to Miguez Bonino, depends on the
obedience of faith, which demands a back-and-forth movement from
text to situation and situation to text. For Miguez Bonino, the obedience
of faith finds its referent in the action of God in history. God acts in
certain, constant ways but through various different methods and means.
Likewise, the obedience of faith requires the use of different means and
methods to testify to and work for the kingdom's transformation of
history.
Interpretation depends on and constitutes praxis itself -- a praxis of
obedience. Interpretation and the larger discipline of theology rest not
on mere theoretical correlations of text and situation but on the lived
relationship of God and the community discerned in the text and the
situation. The activity of the Christian community is, in part, an
interpretive activity -- using the themes of the Scripture to discern the
present action of God and using the experience of God's love to
understand the action of God in the Bible. Interpretation as a praxis of
obedience underlies Miguez Bonino's insistence that, within liberation
theology, "there is, therefore, no knowledge except in action itself, in

the process of transforming the world through participation in
history."29
DISCERNING THE LOGIC OF DEATH
With the hermeneutics of Word and world in hand, we can examine
Miguez Bonino's theological interpretation of violence. In this reading,
Miguez Bonino's hermeneutical foundations and principles are
employed in a consideration of the situation of violence; Miguez
Bonino's interpretation of violence attends both to the social location of
all reflection and to a critical rereading the tradition. Such an
interpretation of violence can serve, as well, to render explicit the
hermeneutics of Word and world in critical evaluation.
Following his hermeneutical principle that interpretation starts in its
own social location, Miguez Bonino suggests that the context of Latin
America is characterized by violence, by the systematic destruction of
human persons. As Miguel Bonino describes the situation: "we are faced
with a total system of death, a threat to all life and to the whole of life."
30 Both the present social location and the Bible suggest that humans are
always engaged in what Miguez Bonino calls the "play of violence." It
does no good, contends Miguez Bonino, to begin with the theoretical
questions of whether or not one should participate in violence: "we are
always -- Christians or not -- actually in the field of action in violence -repressive, subversive, systematic, insurrectional, evident, hidden.
Actively, I say, because our militancy or lack of it -- our daily use of
instrumentalities of the society in which we live out our ethical decision
or renunciations -- make us actors in the game." 31 If this ever present
game of violence seems a shocking revelation, it does, at least, make us
recognize the need for a careful analysis of the social situation within
hermeneutics: idealism can lead either to complete avoidance of
analysis or to an ideological distortion in the interpretation of violence.
There is no such thing as an abstract concept of violence -- violence has
to do with the suffering and perishing of human lives. 32 The
theologian's task is neither to produce an abstract meditation on violence
nor to proclaim a general rule for all times and places, but to interpret
God's activity and the praxis of faith in this situation. Reflecting on our
participation in the social location of theology, we ask the practical
question: What is violence? There are, suggests Miguez Bonino, two
current ideologies or "global perspectives" on violence. 33 The first, the

"priestly" perspectives is based on the belief of a rational universe and
seeks to maintain order in the universe as the will of God. In this
perspective violence is understood as irrationality -- violence disrupts
the rational universe. The second perspective is based upon the belief of
the universe as a project of liberty. In this "prophetic" perspective the
human is the creator, destroying the old for the new in the quest of
progress. Violence, in this prophetic perspective, is understood through
a dialectical philosophy of history in which the negation of old realities
makes room for new possibilities. But both these perspectives, or
ideologies, originate in abstract conceptions of violence and attempt to
apply abstractions to historical situations. Naturally the theological
interpreter must be critical of such abstractions, for the perspectives may
well function to conceal hidden interests, denying the systemic nature of
violence already present in the situation.
To counter the ideological function of these perspectives, Miguez
Bonino turns to what he calls the "general biblical perspective": "the
biblical world is always an announcement-mandate referring to a
concrete human situation that needs to be corrected or transformed in
accordance with this world." 34 In the Bible violence is spoken of only
within specific, narrated events; sometimes violence is forbidden by
God, but other times it is allowed or even ordered by God. Miguez
Bonino concludes that in the Bible violence is always located within the
general theme of transformation; this theme invokes the vision of
freedom by disclosing persons as responsible and free before God. In
general, peace rather than war is preferable, preservation rather than
destruction is encouraged. A hermeneutics of the Word must criticize
the priestly perspective of violence, since a rational universe is possible
only in terms of an ultimate vision of what life ought to be. The
prophetic perspective of a fully liberated universe, on the other hand, is
found in the biblical summons to transformation. Miguez Bonino
contends that the prophetic perspective has, therefore, a certain
"priority" or preference over the priestly, but only for what he calls "a
mode of action" and not as an abstract principle of interpretation.
Having argued that violence is always understood in particular
situations, and that the interpreter cannot decide ahead of time on a
perspective of violence, Miguez Bonino continues his hermeneutics of
violence by exploring the relations between Marxist and Christian
interpretations of violence. To understand his reading of violence in the
relationship between Marxism and Christianity, we must consider
briefly Miguez Bonino's critical appropriation of Marxism for Christian

hermeneutics. Any dialogue between Christianity and Marxism
depends, according to Miguez Bonino, on the fact that in Latin America
the relationship between Marxists and Christians occurs through a
"growing and overt common participation in a revolutionary project, the
basic lines of which are undoubtedly based on a Marxist analysis." 35
But in understanding this relationship there is an obvious problem for
the interpreters of religion: Marx's critique of religion as an opiate of the
people. Without directly addressing the complexity of the development
in Marx's thought, Miguez Bonino identifies two elements in Marx's
critique of religion. First, Marx universalizes religion as a false ideology
that cloaks the interests of the dominant class: "the religious element is
seen always as an ideological screen, as a false consciousness of a real
human need." 36 Second, Marx's ideology critique of religion is
inherently connected to his criticism of the entirety of bourgeois society:
"the criticism of religion is valuable insofar as it is a criticism of
bourgeois society which unveils its dynamics and provides the
revolutionary proletariat with adequate theoretical instruments for
carrying out its historical mission of destroying and overcoming the
society." 37 What interests Miguez Bonino is the second element of
Marx's critique of bourgeois society and its ideology. The value in
Marx's critique is the suspicion and demonstration of how religion
functioned to cover the interests of the state and of the rich in that
specific society.
But this moment of suspicion of religion, according to Miguez Bonino,
is not at all alien to Christianity; an appropriate hermeneutics of the
Word demands a critique of religion: "the Bible does not merely support
the contention that religion becomes an excuse for injustice. It
announces God's active purpose to overturn and destroy such idolatrous
manipulations of his gifts." 38 This is, Miguez Bonino argues, a major
demand of the Christian faith against all idolatry. But the Christian faith
departs from Marx's inference, in the first element of Marx's critique of
religion, that religion is necessarily a mystification of the human
subject. Miguez Bonino accuses Marx of universalizing a specific
interpretation of a situation. Behind the Marxist universalization of
religion lies, Miguez Bonino observes, the belief that no extraneous
mediation is needed for human fulfillment: Marxism assumes that
humanity can and must liberate itself Christianity, however, claims that
such a mediation is, in fact, necessary and available; God, Christianity
affirms, redeems history, providing the very possibility for historical
liberation. And so, Miguez Bonino concludes, the critique of religion is

internal to both Marxism and Christianity but is grounded on different
beliefs. "To put it briefly: in the Bible it is God who de-mystifies man;
for Marx it is man who de-mystifies God. In the process, both are very
suspicious and critical of religion, but from radically different
perspectives."39
Though Marx's critique of religion may be an obvious point to begin the
conversation, Christianity also relates to Marxism through a shared telos
of human fulfillment, a telos usually identified with Western humanism.
Miguez Bonino identifies two general schools of Marxism: scientific
Marxism and humanist Marxism. 40 Scientific Marxism assumes that
human fulfillment will, come about only through revolutionary change
in the modes of production in society. More attentive to the important
role of culture, humanist Marxism locates Marx in the context of a long
humanist tradition; as Miguez Bonino explains in agreement, "in the
context of the long heritage of man's aspirations and struggles for a
more human and just organization of individual and social life." 41 In
the broad tradition of humanism, Marx contributes a philosophy of
history based on the reproductive relations of human society and a
social anthropology of class struggle. This revisionist interpretation of
Marxism allows Christianity to have an affinity to certain broad themes
and select categories within Marxism.
It is the social anthropology of Marxism that Miguez Bonino relates to
Christianity in his interpretation of violence. In the concept of class
conflict, Marx suggests two significant notions -- the human as worker
and the priority of the oppressed. Marx portrayed the human as worker,
"as the being who appropriates, transforms, and humanizes the world
through his work and who himself comes to his own identity, becomes
man through this same work. If this is so, it is only to be expected that
the forms of relationships and organizations in which man works will be
the privileged means for understanding human life and society and that
changes in one area will be closely related to changes in the other." 42
Theological anthropology describes the human in terms of the person's
relationships to self, others, and God. But, Miguez Bonino observes, an
adequate anthropology requires both descriptions of humanity. Indeed
the Bible, contends Miguez Bonino, portrays the relation of humans to
others, self, and God as mediated through work. Conversations about
anthropology with Christians help to deter Marxists from a mechanistic
materialism, and conversations with Marxists help to deter Christians
from idealism.
The second notion that Christians and Marxists share in the

interpretation of violence is the priority of the poor. In the Bible poverty
is seen as scandalous: it contradicts God's purpose, it robs persons of
their subjectivity, and it destroys human solidarity. In light of the
biblical vision of the kingdom of God, Christians take sides with the
poor as the place for the obedience of faith. This privileged option for
the poor, according to Miguez Bonino, is at the level of prophetic
judgment --denouncing the unfair conditions of a social situation.
Marx's category of the "proletariat" is, in humanist Marxism, on a
similar level -- the level of empirical observation and ethical judgment.
Both Marx's category and the Christian option require, in the
revolutionary theory of liberation theology, two further steps: an
analysis of the causes and systems of the injustice, and a strategy for
transforming the situation. 43 And so, Miguez Bonino affirms, Christians
can appropriate Marx's category as both Christians and Marxists seek to
analyze and change the systems of oppression.
Though Christians can work with Marxist categories, they are guided in
their interpretation of violence by the biblical theme of love. In
interpreting this theme, Christians will seek, Miguez Bonino contends,
to follow the paradigm of Jesus. Jesus as a paradigm does not mean love
without justice; Jesus' own love included condemnation, criticism,
rejection, and resistance. Indeed Jesus represents a new way of being in
the world of violence -- Jesus was on the side of the poor and the
oppressed; he was condemned as a messianic ruler. From this
representation of Jesus, Miguez Bonino says that Christians have a
calling to renounce "self-defense and the struggle for power and to offer
themselves, with the oppressed, and on behalf of all, as signs of God's
incoming age of liberation and justice." 44 The temptations of Jesus
suggest that God's action in history is not to place divine omnipotence in
control but to identify with the victims of violence.
From this paradigm of Jesus follow two implications for the Christian
community. First, there is no specifically Christian struggle, since Jesus
rejected a Christian reign or political system. The Christian struggle is
to identify with the other, the victim of violence. As God has revealed
divine action in history by transforming the oppressed into free human
subjects, so Christians take their identification with the victims of
violence as their location in the world. Second, in this all-too-human
struggle, the Christian community has no special techniques or shortcuts
but must use the same tools, forms of analyses, and strategies as others
who participate in the struggle for human freedom.

Miguez Bonino believes that in light of the biblical vision of the
kingdom and paradigm of Jesus, and in light of the specific situation in
Latin America, nonviolent action is the most appropriate and adequate
perspective. 45 The goal of revolution is necessarily the removal of
violence, hence nonviolent action is the closest approximation to the
goal of any true revolution. Furthermore, nonviolence depends on
solidarity, respect for the human person, and the internalization of the
liberation project. Violent revolution far too often threatens to become
counterrevolutionary by replacing one situation of oppression with
another. But if absolute violence cannot be condoned, neither can
pacifism. For pacifism may be too costly: certainly Christians in the
struggle for liberation will witness to their faith -- as well as to the
ultimate goal of revolution -- by insisting on counting carefully the cost
of violence, by fighting against all ideologization of destruction and the
destructive spirit of hate and revenge, by attempting to humanize the
struggle, by keeping in mind that beyond victory there must be
reconciliation and construction. But they cannot block through Christian
scruples the road clearly indicated by a lucid assessment of the situation.
Even less can they play the game of reaction lending support to those
who are profiting from present violence or weakening through
sentimental pseudo Christian slogans (however well-meaning) the will
among the oppressed to fight for their liberation. 46
Miguez Bonino's interpretation of violence should illustrate his basic
assumptions of (1) the social location of theological reflection,
including the use of social scientific theories to analyze the situation,
and (2) the critical rereading of Christian tradition through the use of
biblical themes and paradigms in light of the referent of the kingdom of
God. Yet one immediately wonders if, given the passionate pleas not
only to start in a specific situation but to analyze a specific situation,
Miguez Bonino's interpretation of violence is more a general reading of
the reality of violence than a careful structural analysis of a particular
situation of violence. Given Miguez Bonino's insistence on the
foundation and implications of social location for theological
hermeneutics, is it enough to describe, as self-evident as the description
might be, the structure of life as always a game of violence? Must not a
name be given to this violence, and shall not the structures and systems
of death be uncovered? Unless the situation of violence is analyzed in a
more concrete manner, theological hermeneutics remains in generalities - though now in practical generalities. 47
A similar question can be posed within the relation of Marxism to

Christianity in Miguez Bonino's work. Obviously the status of Miguez
Bonino's work on Marxism is that of an apology -- a defense of the
critical appropriation of Marxism by Christianity. Miguez Bonino insists
that this is a critical appropriation -- the iconoclastic symbols of God
and kingdom will judge any Marxist attempt to deify humanity. But
Miguez Bonino rests his argument for a dialogue between Marxism and
Christianity on the nature of Marxism as a form of humanism. Certainly,
if Marxism is but one expression of the telos of human fulfillment,
Christianity can easily converse with the system, as it has with other
expressions of Western humanism. But what then happens to the claims
for Marxism as a specific form of social analysis? As a form of Western
humanism, Marxism is a philosophy of history, an interpretation of the
nature and purpose of life. Though it might imply the use of certain
social tools, it does not necessitate any specific social theory for
interpretation. 48 As Miguez Bonino realizes, the concept of class
conflict entails an anthropology of change as the oppressed agitate for
greater opportunities for fulfillment. But, again according to Miguez
Bonino, class conflict is not a specific social theory; class conflict is not,
in itself, a tool for analysis or a specific strategy for change. Likewise,
the notion of the human as worker may imply that in any given situation
we must analyze the relations of social structures and individual
freedom; but it does not yield the tools to do such an analysis. Where,
then, does a hermeneutics of the world introduce a specific analysis of
the situation? How do Christians choose among the variety of
sociopolitical analyses, even among the variety of dialectical
sociopolitical analyses? In sum: Miguez Bonino' s use of Marxism
contributes to the demand for the use of social theories in theology, but
it does not provide socioanalytical theories or criteria for the use of such
theories.
The lack of specific arguments to back his theological assumptions also
occurs in Miguez Bonino's hermeneutics of the Word. In light of his
understanding of the Bible as a collection of narrated events governed
by the referent of the kingdom of God, Miguez Bonino contends that
violence is referred to within the Bible only within the larger context of
making possible freedom and responsibility. Thus the Bible condones or
condemns violence as it hinders or promotes freedom. But as persuasive
as Miguez Bonino's assertions are, they lack any specific arguments for
their own validation. Miguez Bonino, be it in interpreting violence or in
arguing for his unity-in-difference relationship between history and
kingdom, does not employ specific historical, sociological, or literary
arguments for either the foundations or the principles of his

hermeneutics of the Word. Without the use of explanatory methods,
theology tempts the danger of reading into the Bible positions in need of
justification.
Though Miguez Bonino' s interpretation of violence does not fulfill all
the requirements of his hermeneutics of Word and world, it does
demonstrate that a hermeneutics of violence is inescapable. For
Christian theology, according to this interpretation, lives in the situation
of death, as Christian praxis identifies with the poor in Latin America.
In this violence of death, Christian theology, in the play of world and
Word, must discern the activity of God and the acts of humanity. If
Miguez Bonino's reading often lacks adequate arguments of analysis
and fails to offer strategies for change, it does set the agenda clearly for
theology: the agenda of discerning God's activity and guiding Christian
praxis in a particular situation -- the situation of violence and death.
From Miguez Bonino's interpretation of violence we also learn that
hermeneutics is appropriation, that in the activity of interpretation we
are changed, transformed, and converted. Indeed this activity of
appropriation between Word and world is essential to the nature of faith,
for there is no rigid Christian way, no literal rules for Christian life. The
way of Christianity, in the paradigm of liberation theology, is the
appropriation of Word and world, the bringing together of human life
and obedience to God in a transformation of history. Indeed the
transformation of history by the kingdom is a model of hermeneutics as
appropriation -- the total immersion, the radical change, the open
questioning, the continuing transformation of history.
CONCLUSION
What, then, happens to theology when it makes a conversion, when it
turns back to reality, when it decides to reflect on the meaning and
power of God's word in this world of the poor? 49
This is the central quest and question of Miguez Bonino's theology.
Theology sets out to speak of God, of the living, powerful presence of
God, in the midst of the wretched of the earth. That theology speaks so
visibly about God as an actor in history may seem odd to ears too
attuned to God as being the victim of history. Miguez Bonino suggests a
new way of talking of God and of history in his hermeneutics of the
Word and the world. This way of talking is concrete -- talking about
specific situations; it is, practical -- talking about events in space and

time; and it is an act of deliberation and judgment -- open to change and
critique. Hermeneutics as a central theological task loses all claims to
universal judgments as it becomes a conversation, a discernment of the
ongoing activity of history and of God. As a conversation, theology as
an activity of appropriation becomes central. For Miguez Bonino,
theology is the continual formation, re-formation and transformation of
theology's conversion to the world.
Within the paradigm of liberation theology, Miguez Bonino stresses the
central importance of hermeneutics -- of interpreting both world and
Word. As compared to modern theology, this hermeneutics takes a
radical turn to social context, including ideology critique and social
theory. Indeed the turn to the social context is based, in part, on its
hermeneutics of the Word revealing the obedience of faith. Miguez
Bonino sets the agenda for a liberation hermeneutics: orienting
interpretation to social analysis, ideology critique, the discernment of
praxis, the transformation of history. But Miguez Bonino's theory only
begins the agenda: his own interpretations are somewhat vague and
general. Arguments as to the primacy of certain symbols or the
particular contents of his own favored themes are often lacking. On the
internal grounds of his hermeneutical theology, more argument and
analysis are needed to verify the adequacy of his interpretation; Miguez
Bonino allows and forces the arguments to be located within the
interpretive activity of faith itself
Latin American liberation theology, Miguez Bonino tells us, speaks of
God through its own participation in history. There is no one language,
no universal method, no one "correct" theory for interpreting the logos
of the Theos in the journey of the poor. Theology has thus entered
history and must participate in the activity of discernment, judgment,
change, and formation that is the activity of Christian obedience. Latin
American liberation theology is a new paradigm of interpretation:
theological hermeneutics names the world in light of the Scriptures but,
likewise, hears the Word in light of a liberating praxis.
NOTES:
1. Jose Miguez Bonino, "The Historical Spectrum of Protestantism in
Latin America: Historical Expressions," CICOP Working Paper
(Davenport, Iowa: Latin America Bureau, 1967), p. 13 (mimeographed).

2. Jose Miguez Bonino, "Five Theses toward an Understanding of the
Theology of Liberation," Expository Times 37 (April 1976): 197-98.
(Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press, 1975), p. 103.
4. Ibid.
5. Jose Miguez Bonino, "Historical Praxis and Christian Identity," in
6. Miguez Bonino, Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, pp. 9091.
7. See Karl-Otto Apel, "Types of Social Sciences in the Light of Human
Interests of Knowledge," Social Research 44 (1977):425-70.
9. For another liberation theologian who uses ideology in a positive
sense, see Juan Luis Segundo, The Liberation of Theology, trans. John
Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1976), as well as his Faith and
Ideologies, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books;
Melbourne: Dove Communications; London: Sheed & Ward, 1984).
11. Liberation theologians differ as to whether ideology critique is a
moment within hermeneutics -- part of the act of interpretation -- or a
related but distinct theory of human freedom. For a nontheological
version of this debate between Hans-Georg Gadamer and Jurgen
Habermas, see Continuum 8 (1970):77-96 and 123-28.
12. Jose Miguez Bonino, Toward a Christian Political Ethics
14. Miguez Bonino argues for a theory of context as well as a theory of

the text in theological hermeneutics. For one exploration of
"contextualization," see Robert J. Schreiter, Constructing Local
Theologies (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1985).
15. Miguez Bonino demands that theology remain, albeit in a
transformed manner, theology -- that it speak of God, and God acting in
history through the events of the present; see Doing Theology in a
Revolutionary Situation, p. 98, and "For Life and Against Death: A
Theology That Takes Sides," Christian Century 97 (November
1980):1156.
16. Miguez Bonino, Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, p.
103.
17. Jose Miguez Bonino, "How Does God Act in History?" in Christ
and the Younger Churches: Theological Contributions from Asia, Africa
and Latin America, ed. Georg Vicedom (London: SPCK, 1972), p. 23.
18. Ibid., pp. 24-25.
19. Ibid., p. 25.
20. This is a good illustration of the fact that even within the paradigm
of liberation theology there are major theological differences between
theologians. Miguez Bonino, like some of liberation theology's critics,
warns against any reduction of redemption to particular acts of
liberation.
21. Miguez Bonino, "Historical Praxis and Christian Identity," p. 272.
22. Ibid., p. 273.
23. Ibid., p. 276.
24. For a more detailed argument on the use of theory and "explanation"
to arrive at an understanding of the text, see Paul Ricoeur, Interpretation
Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning (Fort Worth, Tex.:
Texas Christian University Press, 1976).
26. Ibid., p. 102; see also Jose Miguez Bonino, "Doing Theology in the
Context of the Struggles of the Poor," Mid-Stream 20 (October 198
l):370.
27. Miguez Bonino, "How Does God Act in History?" p. 29.
28. Jose Miguez Bonino, Ama y haz lo que quieras: Hacia una etica del
horn bre neuvo (Buenos Aires: Editorial Escaton, 1972).
30. Miguez Bonino, "For Life and Against Death," p. 1154.
31. Jose Miguez Bonino, "Violence and Liberation," Christianity and
Crisis 32 (June 1972): 169.
126.
33. Miguez Bonino, "Violence and Liberation," pp. 169-70.
34. Ibid., p. 170.
35. Jose Miguez Bonino, Christians and Marxists (Grand Rapids,
Mich.: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1976), p. 16.
36. Ibid., p. 49.
37. Ibid., p. 50.
38. Ibid., p. 65.
39. Ibid., p. 73.
40. For an excellent interpretation of the "two schools" of Marxism, see
Alvin Gouldner, The Two Marxisms: Contradictions and Anomalies in
the Development of Theory (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980).
41. Miguez Bonino, Christians and Marxists, p. 84. Note that Miguez
Bonino is in essential agreement with Metz that Marxism, as a theory of
interpretation, is basically an expression of modern humanism.

108.
43. Ibid., p. 113. Note that Miguez Bonino offers a somewhat different
theological interpretation of the option for the poor from Gutierrez's. For
Gutierrez, the option for the poor is based first upon God's own
choosing to be with the poor; solidarity with the poor is itself a religious
experience. Miguez Bonino bases the option for the poor on the
obedience of faith to a God of love, which necessarily implies justice.
Said differently: for Gutierrez, the poor manifest God's presence; for
Miguez Bonino, Christians are in solidarity with the poor out of
obedience to the proclamation of God's Word. With these two
theologians we see a "manifestation model" and a "proclamation model"
of Christian theology.
123.
45. Ibid., p. 127.
46. Ibid., p. 128.
47. Miguez Bonino calls for the necessary inclusion of theoretical
arguments within theology to aid understanding and transformation; see
"From Praxis to Theory and Back," in Toward a Christian Political
Ethics, pp. 37-53.
48. Miguez Bonino does argue for the use of dialectical sociology
instead of functional sociology, based on the philosophy of history of
conflict. While I agree with his criticism of functionalist sociologies, his
preference for dialectical sociology is still not enough to provide
adequate criteria for the use of empirical analysis or specific strategies
for change. See Miguez Bonino, Toward a Christian Political Ethics,
pp. 46.
49. Miguez Bonino, "Doing Theology in the Context of the Struggles of
the Poor," p. 367.
15

Chopp
Chapter 6: Jurgen Moltmann: The

Language of God as the Language of
Suffering
One of the most important theological works of the 1960s was Theology
of Hope by the German Protestant theologian Jurgen Moltmann.
Though eschatology was already an important symbol in modern
theology, Moltmann succeeded in making it the focal center of
theology. Through that center Moltmann issued a searing critique of
theology, the church, and society; from that center he sent forth an
eschatological knowledge of God, an exodus church, and a new
transformation of society. Theology of Hope was followed by The
Crucified God in which the crucified and resurrected Christ stood with
eschatology in the iconoclastic center of theology. If Theology of Hope
opened the world to the proclaimed nearness of God's future, The
Crucified God shattered history with the manifest presence of the
abandoned Christ in all the forsakenness of this world.
Moltmann's theology is a narrative theology, a re-creation of the
interplay between the Christian message and Christian praxis. Through
Moltmann's works runs the retrieval of forgotten or misplaced symbols:
the center of eschatology, the theology of the cross, the messianic power
of the Holy Spirit, the ecclesiology of the left-wing Reformation, and
the social doctrine of the Trinity. As a systematic theologian, Moltmann
both creates and names Christian praxis with the symbols of the
Christian faith.
Moltmann frequently constructs his systematic interpretations by

structurally opposing them to the formulations of human religiosity
within modern theology. This style of definition through opposition is
the continual trace of Moltmann's neo-orthodox theological method: the
Word of God always arrives in opposition to human expectations and
desires. This theological method of Moltmann's -- which we shall refer
to as the dialectic of contradiction -- does not share liberation theology's
orientation toward suffering or toward human praxis. Moltmann's
narrative readings, however, of a God who is identified in suffering and
hope -- what we shall call the dialectic of identification -- moves
beyond his formal method to provoke a witness to the future of hope in
the memory of suffering. Indeed, the odd status of Moltmann's work -substantively treating God and hope, Christ and suffering, the Spirit and
freedom, but methodologically locked in the paradigm of neo-orthodoxy
-- shall direct us, in the rest of this book, to explore liberation theology
as both a systematic interpretation of the Christian message and a new
theological method.
THE ORIGIN OF MOLTMANN'S POLITICAL THEOLOGY
Jurgen Moltmann wants political theology to exist not as a politicized
theology or as a theology of particular politics, but as a theological
reflection on contemporary life as political and on Christian mission "in
the midst of the public misery of society and struggle against this
misery."1 Moltmann continues: "Political theology is therefore not
simply political ethics but reaches further by asking about the political
consciousness of theology itself. It does not want to make political
questions the central theme of theology or to give political systems and
movements religious support. Rather, political theology designates the
field, the milieu, the environment and the medium in which Christian
theology should be articulated today."2
Moltmann begins his political theology not with the rupture of events of
suffering or with the interruption of history by the subjects of suffering,
but with a bold critique of earlier forms of neo-orthodox theology.3 Karl
Barth, says Moltmann, secured theology in the self-revelation of God
but supplanted the God of the Bible with the Greek epiphany of eternal
presence.4 Moltmann's discontent with Barth pertains to Barth's
interpretation of God: for Barth, God reveals himself as the Wholly
Other, relating to the world in a suprahistorical manner and calling each
individual to make a personal decision. The cause for Moltmann's
disdain at this point is quite clear: Barth did not read the Bible long
enough to realize that his "wholly other" God is not the God of
Abraham, Moses, and David. Rudolf Bultmann fares equally poorly
under Moltmann's critical pen: Bultmann attempted to prove God by
human experience, and thus reduced the Christian faith to a notion of
authentic existence.5 Bultmann, Moltmann claims, offers a religion of
the timeless self, pretending that revelation somehow depends upon
human experience. Barth eternalizes God, Bultmann eternalizes
humankind: but the sin is the same, judges Moltmann, for both privilege
a "mysticism of being," an exaltation of present temporality.6 What
upsets Moltmann the most is that these existentialist theologians
misinterpret the Christian message and thus reduce Christianity to an
epiphany religion -- a religion built on human desires and cultural
myths. The corrective to the reductions of existentialist theology, argues
Moltmann, commences out of the eschatological center of the Christian
faith. From this eschatological center comes the self-revelation of a God
whose essential nature is the future and who calls persons to an active
life of hope in a history made possible by God's promises. Moltmann's
corrective to existentialist theologies brings us to the central goal of
Moltmann's theology: the retrieval of the narratives and symbols of
Christian faith. The origin of Moltmann's call for a political theology is
the attempt to arrive at a correct understanding of the Christian
message.
Consequently, for Moltmann, only as political theology grasps the heart
of the Christian message can it comprehend suffering as the main
agenda for contemporary theology. The centrality of suffering in
contemporary theology depends not on the magnitude of suffering, not
on the interruption of the poor, and not on the memory of Auschwitz,
but on the gospel itself. Moltmann interprets the present situation
through suffering; indeed, for Moltmann the modern world is identified
largely with suffering: economic exploitation, political oppression,
cultural alienation through racism and sexism, emptiness in personal
life, physical suffering, and environmental destruction.7 People,
Moltmann observes, suffer from a deeply "ingrained primal fear" of the
death of humankind. This suffering, for Moltmann, is God's own cry,
for God suffers in and through human suffering: "he suffers with them,
he suffers because of them, he suffers for them. His suffering is his
messianic secret."8 Suffering is both understood and responded to
through the prism of the Christian message.
It is important to contrast Moltmann's origin of political theology with
those of the other theologians in this book: their call for a theology of
liberation -- articulated in the language of rupture, break, interruption -depends upon the question of suffering and the foundation of praxis.
Within this new paradigm, liberation theologians retrieve and reinterpret
the Christian tradition; for Moltmann, on the other hand, it is a new
interpretation of the Christian message that forces a paradigm shift. Said
somewhat differently: for Moltmann, Christianity interprets suffering,
but suffering does not interrupt Christianity.
But Moltmann does remind us that the Christian Scriptures present a
radical narrative that must be joined with a radical witness of Christian
praxis. Christian praxis, the experience of following Christ in the world,
is opposed to the dictates of modern religion and modern theology; it is
folly to the world, a contradiction in history. As the interpretation of
God's Word, theology has to reveal the radical contradiction between
God's Word and human reason, between God's future and human
destiny. Only in the interpretation of the radical narrative of God will
Christian praxis be formed as a witness to God. Theology, in
Moltmann's work, substantively interprets the narratives of God while it
formally reveals the contradiction between God and world.
THE ADVENT OF HOPE
The first, and most primary, narrative of God is developed in
Moltmann's Theology of Hope and centers on the symbol of
eschatology. For Moltmann, Christianity -- its message and its witness -is eschatology.9 The definitive event of Christian eschatology is the
revelation of God in Jesus Christ.10 The revelation of Jesus Christ does
not portray an epiphany of the eternal present that sanctifies the present
in correspondence to the cosmos. Disclosing God as always and only
the coming one, the revelation of Christ is, instead, the advent of
history, the opening up of the future of freedom. Well within Christian
tradition, Moltmann recognizes that the resurrection appearances of
Christ affirm the importance of the incarnation. And so, Moltmann
concludes, the resurrection becomes the ground for faith's remembrance
of the incarnation of Christ. But the resurrection appearances also affirm
the reality of Christ in the future, an affirmation that becomes
anticipation -- the foretaste of what will be.11 The identity of Christ as
the resurrection of the crucified one is, for Moltmann, an identification
of the memory and hope of the future. "It is this that forms the ground
of the promise of the still outstanding future of Jesus Christ. It is this
that is the ground of the hope which carries faith through the trials of
the god-forsaken world and of death."12 Easter and the resurrection

appearances are not merely events of the past, they are also events of the
future -- as yet unfinished.
Moltmann opposes his interpretation of the resurrection-crucifixion of
Christ to the dying and rising of the lord of the cultus. Within the
epiphany of the eternal present, the lord of the cultus is far removed
from history: within the resurrection of this lord, redemption is
instantaneous and ahistorical. The resurrection of Christ, Moltmann
counters, points beyond itself to the future God, but it points beyond
itself only because it has taken history within itself through the
crucifixion. Within eschatology, then, there is an internal dialectic of
identification between the cross and the resurrection of Christ: in this
identification, the promise of God is revealed in its universal
significance for humanity.
But Moltmann directs his attention not to the identification between the
cross and resurrection within Christ, but to the nature of this event as
revelation. In this narrative of God, Moltmann examines the nature of
revelation through the structure of God's promises. To understand what
Moltmann means by promise, we must first recognize that, whatever it
may mean, the promise of God is not inherent in universal history, or
above history in salvation history, or within the present in the harmony
between humanity and eternal being. The promise of God is the
shattering arrival of the future into the present: the promise comes from
God who is in the future, "not in us or above us but always and only
before us."13 Revelation depends on God's own faithfulness to divine
promises, and therefore the knowledge of God is not God's eternal
presence, but God's future, God's presence in history as the not-yet, the
new, the claim for fulfillment in history.
The revealing of the divinity of God therefore depends entirely on the
real fulfilment of the promise, as vice versa the fulfilment of the
promise has the ground of its possibility and of its reality in the
faithfulness and the divinity of God. To that extent "promise" does not
in the first instance have the function of illuminating the existing reality
of the world or of human nature, interpreting it, bringing out its truth
and using a proper understanding of it to secure man's agreement with
it. Rather, it contradicts existing reality and discloses its own process
concerning the future of Christ for man and the world. Revelation,
recognized as promise and embraced in hope, thus sets an open stage for
history, and fills it with missionary enterprise and the responsible
exercise of hope, accepting the suffering that is involved in the

contradiction of reality, and setting out towards the promised future.14
Revelation comes through God's promises, promises that both contradict
"natural" human knowledge and open up history for God's future.
Since the knowledge of God arrives only through God's own promises,
we cannot rely upon natural knowledge to "reflect" God or to
understand the nature of God's revelation. Rather, to receive God's
revelation, we must turn to the book of God's promises, the Bible.
Moltmann contends that in the Old Testament God is revealed as one
who creates a future for Israel in faithfulness to God's promises. For
Israel the appearance of God is immediately linked to the giving of a
promise. The identity of Israel lies in its remembrance of God's
promises and the expectation of their continued fulfillment. This
distinguishes Israel's religion from other religions, and forces Israel to
eradicate from its midst any elements of an idolatrous epiphany religion.
The call to Abraham can be best understood as a promise to be filled,
transformed, and filled again; this call appropriately becomes
paradigmatic for Israel. The history of Israel is now a journey, a journey
of faith and hope toward a future. The continual filling, overfilling, and
reinterpreting of God's promises to Israel is what Moltmann calls the
"overspill" of God's promise; the overspill guarantees the dynamic
nature of revelation, for the fulfillment of any particular promise is not
yet the fulfillment of God's future.
Revelation thus travels into history through the promises of God. These
promises, God's revelation, are contained in the Bible. The biblical
prophets record God's promises as the revelation of God as the Lord of
all people -- a Lord with the power over life and death.15 In the
apocalyptic literature, God is revealed as Lord over the entire cosmos.16
The Bible, the book of God's promises, discloses the entirety of creation
-- suffering and groaning to be remade -- as involved in the
eschatological history of God.
Revelation arrives through promises and promises are found in the
Bible; but what, we might ask, is revelation -- what does it do? Promise,
as revelation, Moltmann answers, is a declaration of God that creates
history.17 Declaration, in Moltmann's sense, means not a simple
descriptive statement but, rather, a creative act -- the formation of
history itself. As declared through God's promises, history is the time of
remembrance and expectation, the recollection of past promises and the
anticipation of their future fulfillment. Revelation not only gives us

knowledge of God, it also creates history -- it opens history for the new.
Stated differently: revelation gives history a new future. From this
vantage point of revelation, Moltmann criticizes views of history that
deny the importance of the new by crystallizing the meaning of life
above, beyond, or apart from history. Such views of history -- against
the biblical promises of revelation -- deny the radicality of the future
and ignore the unrest and suffering of the present age. Within this
narrative of God, historical events are provisional; remarks Moltmann,
"they intimate and point forward to something which does not yet exist
in its fullness in themselves."18 The recipients of revelation -- those who
have ears to hear the promise -- live in the time of the not-yet,
continually anticipating the coming of the future.
The narrative of God -- not just a story about God but the enactment of
God in history -- can, so far, be construed as Revelation-PromiseHistory, beginning, so to speak, with the radically creative revelation of
God's promise. But we might also want to read this narrative the other
way round, and ask about the nature of promise from the experience of
history. How do we, in other words, receive or experience the giving,
fulfilling, and transforming of God's promise? In this reading, the
character of promise names the horizon of experience as anticipatory
through a continual process of the overspill of promise. In the overspill
of promise, experience transforms memory by projecting new
possibilities into the future; experience anticipates this future by
transforming the present in its recollection of the past. Moltmann
suggests that within the horizon of promise, the experience of history is
both the experience of future possibilities and the experience of the
totally new: the future is known as futur and zukunft. Zukunft, literally
"coming to," forms the present as an anticipation of the future. Zukunft
names the not-yet of the new, or, in Moltmann's words, "the future does
not simply emerge from the present, either as a postulate or a result; the
present springs from a future which one must be expectant of in
transience."19 Futur names the experience of the relation between being
and not-yet being, "the temporal prolongation of being."20 And the
present, with the experience of futur and zukunft, exists in relationship
to the past, for history is the reconciliation of memory with its future. In
this reading of the narrative of God, what is essential in the experience
of futur and zukunft is the temporality invoked -- time, as displayed in
this narrative, is the reconciliation of the past and the future.
Christian experience can also be expressed through the relationship of
immanence and transcendence in history.21 For the Christian, living

between God's promises and their fulfillment, history is immanence, the
presence of God. Transcendence is the limit of experience both
negatively, as that which is not finite, and positively, as finitude's
transformation. As the realization of the new, transcendence is not to be
reduced to immanence or seen as its contrary but, rather, understood as
its fulfillment and at the same time its transformation. As fulfillment,
transcendence lures immanence to its potentialities that, as
transformation, transcendence negates and gives again in new forms of
immanence. For Moltmann, immanence and transcendence exist
together, not in contradiction but within a dialectic of identification that
reveals history as open.22
What Moltmann suggests in the peculiar nature of promise and the
relation of transcendence and immanence is the dynamic process of
limitation, negation, fulfillment, and transformation of experience in the
future. History, for Moltmann, is open both as revealed in the text of
promises -- the Bible -- and in our experience of God's immanence and
transcendence. This is a narrative of God, a story of God's being as
future, of God's providence as liberating, of God's transcendence as
wholly transforming. Moltmann has offered God's narrative as the hope
of the future, a hope that creates and discloses the temporality of
history. Hope is the futurity of life, the breaking of all possibilities, the
advent and the future of history itself.
Having thus arrived at freedom, we can finish this narrative of God:
God-Revelation-Promise-History-Experience-Hope. The narrative can,
however, be read two ways: as coming from God to humanity; or as
being represented by Christianity through the play of text and life. The
narrative of God has two central aspects: the formal character and the
substantive nature of God's revelation. The first aspect, the formal
character -- the "how" of revelation and Moltmann's major concern in
this narrative -- necessitates that God cannot be known through human
history but must be revealed through God's promises in unique events.23
What we know and say of God arises not out of our own longing,
experience, or knowledge, but only through God's revelation that both
breaks into and creates human history. The formal character of God's
narrative is Moltmann's method of a dialectic of contradiction between
God and world.
The second aspect, the substantive nature or the "what" of revelation,
names God as the creator of possibilities, of hope, of freedom, and of
newness in the experience of God's promise-filled history by Christians.

In this dialectic of identification, the Christian narrative is the
experience of God's revelation through promise, as recorded in the
Scriptures of the Christian community. Through these promises God is
revealed and experienced as a future God, and eschatology is revealed
and received as the center of faith. In this experience and knowledge,
futur and zukunft, immanence and transcendence, always exist together
in a dialectic of identification. Another dialectic of identification was
suggested by Moltmann in the identification of the cross and
resurrection of Jesus Christ: in the next narrative, this dialectic of
identification becomes the revelation of God.
THE CROSS AND THE RESURRECTION
If the first narrative of God creates history, then the second narrative of
Christ, the subject matter of Moltmann's The Crucified God, redeems
history through an identification of the cross and the resurrection and of
suffering and hope. For Moltmann, the two contrary moments of
suffering and hope within history join in a dialectic that is named in the
central Christian symbol. It is a dialectic not of contradiction -juxtaposed to identity -- but of identification within suffering and hope
and within the cross and the resurrection of Christ. As the dialectic of
identification suggested in the reception of the first narrative of God
(both immanence and transcendence, both futur and zukunft,) this
dialectic both discloses and transforms human experience. But unlike
the identification of futur and zukunft and that of immanence and
transcendence, which arrive last in the narrative of God, this dialectic of
identification occupies the central terms of the narrative of Christ.
Nevertheless, as we shall see, the dialectic of contradiction asserts itself
in this second narrative, through the quest for a correct concept of God
in light of the suffering of the cross.
Moltmann maintains that the dialectic of identification of the cross and
the resurrection is a "continuity in radical discontinuity" and that the
understanding of this dialectic has been the central problem in most
Christological controversies.24 Christologies have traditionally solved
the problem, Moltmann contends, by sublating the cross into the
resurrection (Docetism) or by elevating the Easter appearances and life
of Jesus (Ebionitism) or by reducing the cross-resurrection to two
distinct modes of expression (Modalism). But Moltmann insists that not
to keep the problem unresolved, that is, not to accept the dialectic in the
relation of cross and resurrection, is to deny the symbolic power and
truth of the event. The cross and the resurrection cannot be understood
if one is sublated into the other; to deny the dialectic -- to reduce the
tension of the cross and the resurrection -- is once again to base religion
on human understanding. The key, for Moltmann, lies in understanding
that the resurrection does not solve the crucifixion but intensifies it so
that the crucifixion forces the radicality of the resurrection as the
resurrection of the crucified and not just "any" resurrection.
The dialectic of identification reveals in turn a dialectic of suffering and
hope in which "the two experiences stand in a radical contradiction to
each other, like death and life, nothing and everything, godlessness and
the divinity of God. But how can it be possible to identify both
experiences in one and the same person without resolving either the one
experience or the other and making it of no account?"25 This dialectic of
suffering and hope, of the cross and the resurrection is not the radically
negative contradiction between God and world in eschatology, but the
mysterious and even ambiguous identification of suffering and hope
within time, within the narrative of God and history. Now we know
God's hope in suffering, God's light in darkness, and God's name in
godforsakenness.
In developing a Christology through a dialectic of identification, we
must not make the choice, Moltmann believes, between Jesusology with
its reference to the earthly life of Jesus and its stress on historicalcritical methods and a high Christology using only theologicalphilosophical speculations.26 Rather, history and eschatology must be
read together so that history as recollection and history as hope become
complementary with hope in the form of recollection. The historical
understanding of Jesus is to be read with what Moltmann calls the
eschatological-theological understanding of Christ.
Moltmann begins the reciprocal relationship of history and eschatology
in Christology by focusing on the death of Jesus.27 The death of Jesus,
Moltmann contends, must be understood as the violent end of Jesus in
the context of his life and in the context of the belief in the
resurrection.28 Moltmann recalls the various trials of Jesus in order to
understand the death of Jesus in the context of his life. These trials
involve being tried as a blasphemer before the Jews, as a rebel before
the Roman state, and as the Son abandoned by his Father, God..
The conflict of Jesus with the Jewish law centered on the issue of the
righteousness of God in keeping the promises to Israel. Jesus
proclaimed a God of eschatological forgiveness and gracious mercy

whose love was free from human observation of the law.29 Hence Jesus
put God and himself above the authority of Moses and the law. As
Moltmann comments: "in his ministry Jesus placed himself with
sovereign authority above the limits of the contemporary understanding
of the law. . ."30 The Jews judged Jesus according to their law as a
blasphemer for placing himself above the law and for forgiving sins, an
act the Jews reserved for God alone.
The death of Jesus also must be seen, contends Moltmann, in the
context of his conflict with Roman authorities. The freedom that Jesus
taught meant the abolishment of the state's religious foundations, since
Jesus taught and brought about a rejection of human self-deification in
the state.31 In an age in which religion and politics were inseparable in
the very foundations of the state, Jesus was a rebel who threatened the
Roman empire.
The political conflict with the Romans and the religious conflict with
the Jews explain why Jesus was crucified as a rebel and a blasphemer.
There remains, however, the question of the suffering of Jesus on the
cross. Other persons, such as Socrates or the Zealot martyrs, died
because of political and religious conflicts and passively accepted their
fate.32 But as Moltmann reads this narrative, Jesus did not passively
accept his death upon a cross as fate. Quite the contrary, on the cross
Jesus cried out in suffering and agony; Jesus died, describes Moltmann,
"with the signs and expressions of a profound abandonment by God."33
To understand this suffering, Moltmann returns to the biblical accounts
of the life and ministry of Jesus. According to these accounts,
Moltmann isolates the uniqueness of the life of Jesus in his close
fellowship with God and in his identification with God in the act of the
forgiveness of sins. And having discovered this uniqueness, Moltmann
can now interpret the impact, the tragedy, and the uniqueness of the
cross: the cross denies, forgets, ruptures this fellowship and
identification between Jesus and God. Jesus died on the cross not only
as a rebel and a blasphemer, but also as one abandoned by God. The
cries of agony by Jesus are the expression of this abandonment by the
God he knew and proclaimed, the God of grace and love. What is at
stake, in this event, Moltmann argues, is the very deity of God.34 Psalm
22, the cry of Jesus in his tortured agony, could be, Moltmann observes,
appropriately rendered, "My God, why hast thou forsaken thyself."35
Here, on the cross, is God (Jesus Christ) abandoned by God (Jesus
Christ's father): The rejection expressed in his dying cry, and accurately
interpreted by the words of Psalm 22, must therefore be understood

strictly as something which took place between Jesus and his Father,
and in the other direction between his Father and Jesus, the Son -- that
is, as something which took place between God and God. The
abandonment on the cross which separates the Son from the Father is
something which takes place within God himself; it is stasis within God - "God against God" -- particularly if we are to maintain that Jesus bore
witness to and lived out the truth of God.36
This is, thus far, only half of a Christology, or we might say only half of
this narrative of Christ, for the Gospel texts must also be read from the
point of view of eschatology in terms of the belief in the resurrection.
Moltmann reconstructs a notion of the resurrection of the dead as the
focal point to read the narratives from eschatology. In Jewish
apocalyptic teaching the resurrection of the dead is a sign of the end
times and the beginning of a new creation. As a sign of a new
beginning, the resurrection of the dead does not entail a return to this
life but, rather, the annihilation of the powers of death through a
creation of new life. In the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, God
transforms this "promise" so that "the new world of righteousness and
presence of God has already dawned in this one person in the midst of
our history of death."37 The transformation of this symbol to the
resurrection of the dead in Jesus recognizes that in this one man, raised
before all other persons, a new creation is presented and anticipated.
This is a "new eschatological sense of time" that is constitutive for the
eschatological faith of Christianity. The future is now, in the present.
The way of life in the future -- the forgiveness of sins, reconciliation,
discipleship -- is presented as a possible way of life.
There is, Moltmann maintains, another level to the symbol of
resurrection in "apocalyptic" Judaism: resurrection also represents the
righteousness of God in light of the suffering of the world. The question
of unjust suffering in apocalyptic literature found an answer in the
resurrection of the dead as a logical consequence to the righteousness of
God.38 In this meaning of the resurrection, the question of unjust
suffering will be answered in the future when God's righteousness will
be demonstrated as God assigns some to eternal punishment and some
to eternal glory. In the resurrection of Jesus, this notion of resurrection
as righteousness and suffering is also transformed. In the crucifixionresurrection of Jesus the cross represents suffering and the anticipation
of judgment, and the resurrection is the demonstration of the
righteousness of God that creates right for all. Jesus Christ anticipates
the kingdom of God as the one who represents the suffering of the
world in the final fulfillment of love. "Thus the cross of Christ modifies
the resurrection of Christ under the conditions of the suffering of the
world so that it changes from being a purely future event to being an
event of liberating love."39
This reading of the crucifixion-resurrection from the side of history and
from eschatology, Moltmann contends, forces theology to rethink its
concept of God.40 The historical understanding of Jesus calls for a
reconceptualization of God in light of the absolute separation within
God on the cross. The eschatological understanding of the crucifixion
and resurrection demands a notion of God creating history from the
future. Now Moltmann sublates the dialectic of identification into the
familiar dialectic of contradiction: the cross-resurrection forces God to
be understood as the one who raises Jesus from the dead -- outside the
limits of history, from the future. Moltmann displaces the material
dialectic of identification with the formal dialectic of contradiction,
replacing the material reading with a conceptual question. To pursue
this conceptualization of God forced by the suffering in God and God in
suffering, Moltmann retrieves the symbol of the Trinity formulated as
an open, history-creating and history-transforming event.
As the doctrine of the God who suffers, the Trinity is a shorthand
explanation of the passion-resurrection narratives. The Son suffers
dying forsaken by the Father. The Father suffers the death of the Son.
The Spirit proceeds from this event as the Spirit that creates love and
brings the dead alive. The Trinity is the open symbol of the possibility
of new creation, for in the context of the suffering in God -- the
suffering of the grieving Father, and the suffering of the abandoned Son - the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son to anticipate and bring
about a new creation.
The Trinity is not a "closed" system, but an "eschatological process
open for men on earth, which stems from the cross of Christ.41 In the
open event of the Trinity, all suffering is placed in the context of the
radical ground of all suffering, the cross, and answered by the
anticipation of the end of history through the eschatological time
presented and represented in Christ. The Trinity presents the narrative
of the suffering of Christ through the reformulation of the open event of
the abandonment of the Son by the Father; the loss of the Father by the
Son; and the inner unity of the Spirit. This social conception of the
Trinity, Moltmann contends, allows us to arrive at the proper doctrine of
God. The Trinity also answers the question of the righteousness of God
by the resurrection of Christ as the representation of suffering in the
anticipation of the end of history. The sending of the Spirit opens the
history of God's love in suffering for the whole world. The sending of
the Spirit begins the reverse process of history in the Trinity from Son
to Father as Spirit to liberate the world into a new glorified creation and
to bring it into unity in the Son to give to the Father.
If eschatology displays the horizon of God's narrative, then together the
cross and the resurrection ground the center of this narrative; God is
known through suffering as God suffers. But in the resurrection of the
crucified one, a new eschatological future for all creation is anticipated.
If the first narrative of God creates history, the second narrative redeems
history through the anticipation of righteousness and the representation
of new life for all. At the center of Christian faith is a belief in the
suffering of God identified with the hope of the future. That is why
Christian faith has a Trinity, for only the Trinity tells the story of God
separated, abandoned, and yet identified with reunion, love, and hope.
For Moltmann, the Trinity has a unique status as it represents the
dialectic of the identification of suffering and hope, of the cross and
resurrection and as it secures the dialectic of contradiction between God
and world.
With the Trinity as the proper understanding of God, Moltmann can
place all human suffering within God and can narrate the process of
God's history as the reunion of the separated.
The "bifurcation" in God must contain the whole uproar of history
within itself. Men must be able to recognize rejection, the curse, and
final nothingness in it. . . . The concrete "history of God" in the death of
Jesus on the cross on Golgotha therefore contains within itself all the
depths and abysses of human history and therefore can be understood as
the history of history. All human history, how ever much it may be
determined by guilt and death, is taken up into this "history of God," i.e.
into the Trinity, and integrated into the future of the "history of God."
There is no suffering which in this history is not God's suffering; no
death which has not been God's death in the history of Golgotha.42
The privileging of the cross-resurrection has become, for Moltmann, a
conceptual inclusion of history into the openness of God. In the concept
of the Trinity, the cross is the total measure of suffering; the Trinity
occludes all human suffering into one symbol. Though suffering may be
the main agenda item for a political theology, it is, in Moltmann,

understood only through an appropriate idea of God.
Once again the substantive interpretation of the cross-resurrection must
be distinguished from the formal nature of Moltmann's method. The
substantive interpretation -- the actual reading of the narrative of Christ - holds suffering and hope together as always in relation to the
identification of the cross and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In this
dialectic of identification of cross and resurrection, suffering forces the
quest of righteousness in a hope that includes all who suffer, both the
living and the dead. The narrative of God in the cross and resurrection
of Christ forms, informs, and transforms suffering through an
identification with hope. In this narrative the suffering of the cross
receives its meaning as yet to be fulfilled in the resurrection, and the
hope of the resurrection knows its meaning only through its
identification with the suffering of the cross. But the formal nature of
the cross-resurrection locates the uniqueness of this event in the Trinity,
which in turn incorporates the suffering of history in itself. The Trinity
joins suffering and hope only in the conception of God abandoning
God: the experience of identification exists on~y in a future redemption
when the Spirit unites all creation into God. Though the identification of
the cross and the resurrection could name and be named within the
human experience of suffering and hope, Moltmann finalizes the
relation of suffering and hope by placing it within an adequate
conception of God. In sum: the narrative of Christ, the crucified God,
substantively discloses the identification of suffering and hope while it
formally answers all suffering through a concept of God as the open
Trinity.
THE SPIRIT AND THE CHURCH
From the redeeming act of the crucified God, the Spirit is sent forth to
bring all of history back into unity with God. In this third narrative, the
narrative of the Spirit, God moves through history: uniting the
separated, healing the broken, guiding the lost, and leading history
toward the final goal of God. This narrative of God reveals neither the
horizon of God in eschatology nor the limit-experience of God in crossresurrection, but the constant movement of God in history. The nature
of the Spirit depends, for Moltmann, on the event of Christ as the
ultimate promise of God's action in history, incorporating the world's
suffering into God. The nature of the Spirit is the ongoing identification
of suffering and hope, the resurrection of the crucified, the power that
gives love and brings the dead alive. Moltmann's reading of this
narrative begins with the nature of the Spirit guiding history toward
God. This is the narrative most intimately connected with Christian
experience: with this narrative, Christian experience becomes part of the
constant play of God in history.
Disclosing and declaring that God is in the world, the narrative of the
Spirit uniquely guides the exodus church.43 The church exists for God
in the power of the Spirit: the Spirit creates, baptizes, serves, and
proclaims through the church. Through the Spirit the church participates
in the reunion of God's creation, and in the Spirit the church testifies to
God's love through solidarity with those who suffer. Founded in God's
mission of transforming and creating history, Moltmann's exodus
church is the herald neither of its own nature and roles nor of society's
needs and wants but of God's kingdom and rule.
This narrative of God must be talked about as the presence of the Spirit
in the exodus church, a presence that, for Moltmann, is understood only
in light of the other narratives of God. Thus the exodus church,
according to Moltmann, has an eschatological orientation, pointing
toward the open future of God. Precisely because of its openness to God
and the future, the exodus church is engaged in following Christ in the
world. As the promises of God are decisively revealed in Jesus Christ,
so the mission of the church is decisively formed in the service of Christ
in the world. "The pro missio of the kingdom is the ground of the
mission of love to the world."44 The mission of the church testifies to
Christ's identification of suffering and hope through the power of the
Spirit.
For Moltmann, this mission of the church mandates that the church, as
the church of Christ, is found wherever Christ is present. To locate the
church, we first have to ask the question of Christ's presence in the
world. Moltmann answers by locating Christ's presence in the world in
two places -- with the apostolate and with the least of the brethren.
Christ promised to be present in the apostolic witness, including the
proclamation of the Word, the administration of sacraments, the
existence of the apostolic, and the fellowship of believers. But Christ
also promised to be present with the least of the world; for according to
Matthew 25, "if the thesis ubi Christus, ibi ecclesia is to be considered a
valid one, then this story with its promise of the presence of the Judge
of the world is part of the doctrine of the church and the place where it
is to be found."45 This double presence of Christ in history receives its
unity only through the presence of Christ in the future, or in Christ's

parousia. Christ's presence in the apostolate and in the least of the
brethren represents Christ's future as they point to the future judgment,
and they anticipate Christ's future as they incarnate the significance of
the future in the present. If the promise of God in the first narrative
anticipates and represents the future, and if the cross-resurrection of
Jesus Christ in the second narrative anticipates and represents new life,
so the church of the Spirit in the third narrative of God anticipates and
represents the future kingdom.
Central to this ecclesiology is the denial of any social foundation or
function of the church. The church does not, in Moltmann's theology,
arise out of human longing or human need, but is given -- created by
God in the unique event of Jesus Christ. "The church's first word is not
'church' but Christ."46This unique foundation of the church parallels the
formal dialectic of contradiction of God's promise, which is other than
human history and knowledge. As God's promise is other than human
knowledge, so the church differs radically from any human
organization. As eschatology mandated the critique of modern forms of
religion, so the unique foundation of Christ necessitates the criticism of
society by the church. And, indeed, Moltmann's interpretation of the
modern church is one of the most trenchant criticisms of the function of
the church in modern society.47
Modern society, Moltmann believes, determines its social relations on
the needs of labor and consumption; all other needs in this modern
world are left to the realm of the private. In modernity the church
functions to disburden the individual, taking care of personal and
psychic needs that if left unattended might threaten to disrupt the free
society. Religion is, according to Moltmann, a cultus privatus in which
religious belief, reduced to a mere whim of personal opinion, can be
neither demonstrated nor refuted. The theology of cultus privatus makes
faith personal, but socially irrelevant. In modernity the church also
functions to provide some sense of community in a depersonalized and
rationalized world. But the church artificially creates this supposedly
meaningful community through the collection of homogenous
individuals. Moltmann labels such "community" as a Noah's-ark version
of the church that attempts to "balance" life for the individuals.48 The
church also functions as an institution that projects security by attending
to modes of religious conduct such as church membership rather than
vital decisions of faith and life. Moltmann describes how "specialties"
and bureaucracy divide the church, reducing theological criticism to
perspectival relativism. What Moltmann is after is the distorted mission

of the church in modernity: the modern church secures the bourgeois
individual, destroys any vestige of critical reflection, and denies the
narrative of God declared and experienced in the Spirit.
But, of course, society's church is not the real church; the real church
cannot function to secure the bourgeois individual or to protect a social
system. Founded in God's future, formed in the crucifixion and
resurrection of Christ and empowered by the Spirit, the real church,
what Moltmann names the "exodus church," exists as a radical critique
of the present. The unique foundation of the church in Christ provides
the church with a privileged place, immune from becoming a civil or a
political religion. Indeed the church receives, from its foundation in
Christ and through its guidance of the Spirit, the function of being a
critical institution.49 Between its horizon of eschatology in the coming
of the Christ and its following of Christ in solidarity with the least of the
brethren, the church stands against all forms of oppression.
But the church is not only characterized by its location in Christ's
presence and its critical function; the church is also characterized by its
nature as a congregation. The congregation is a charismatic community,
where each person receives the gifts of the Spirit. In the congregation,
membership is voluntary; all are called to be in the mission of God's
future, and the church is set apart from the world in order to be a part of
history's transformation through the Spirit. Moltmann finds his role
model for the congregation in the left wing of the reformation, with
what he calls "the reformation of life through love."50
Relying upon his familiar rhetoric of opposition, Moltmann compares
his congregation with the pastoral church of modern society. The
pastoral church is composed of homogenous individuals: the
congregation is composed of disparate individuals called by God. The
congregation is based on God's suffering and God's future in the event
of Jesus Christ; the pastoral church is based on self-justification and
social need. The pastoral church is legalistic, which makes the Christian
life more and more conforming, more and more anxious, more and more
closed. The congregation demands a public commitment; the pastoral
church accepts only a private commitment.
In the congregation, Christians live a messianic lifestyle.51 The
Christian lives in hope, between the memories and fulfillment of God's
promises centered in the resurrection of the crucified Lord. The
Christian is justified by Christ and lives towards the future. Indeed, it is

this justification of faith that allows a Christian praxis of solidarity with
those who suffer and the constant criticism of oppression, injustice, and
violence. Faith participates in suffering and prays that suffering will be
no more; faith leads to anticipation as Christians empty themselves for
God and to political action as Christians give themselves in the struggle
for life against death.52 As a trial of tensions and struggles, the life of
faith is also a testimony of joy and hope.
The church, as the narrative of the Spirit, is substantively the ongoing
testimony of following Christ both in his apostolate and in the solidarity
with the least of the brethren. The church lives a life of anticipation, of
resistance, of representation, and of self-giving. As a community critical
of the world, the church sacrifices itself for the world in the unifying
action of the Spirit. It lives where Christ lives, it functions for God, it
exists as a congregation of messianic love. The narrative of the
Christian community is its ongoing life -- the identification of suffering
and hope. But this narrative is connected to Moltmann's formal method - the dialectic of contradiction -- through the claim for the church's
unique foundation in the event of Christ, untouched by social
functioning or human need, completely separated from social
foundations or human experience. Viewed from this unique foundation
the church is not composed of believers who are also human beings
caught in the ambiguities of history, but is "composed," as Moltmann
puts it, solely of where Christ is in history The church is where Christ
is, and where Christ is there is the church: Moltmann thus safeguards
the church from fully entering history by privileging its foundation in
the promise of Christ. This privileging tempts the church to believe that
its narrative is the final understanding of human history and that its
knowledge is the real comprehension of human suffering.
METHOD, SUFFERING, AND PRAXIS
Within Moltmann's theology we have considered two distinct ways of
reading the narratives of God. One reading, what we have called the
dialectic of identification, names the Christian testimony as the
identification of the cross and the resurrection and of suffering and hope
in the substantive nature of Moltmann's theology The second reading,
which we have referred to as the dialectic of contradiction, declares the
opposition of God and world within Moltmann's formal theological
method. The point of distinguishing these two readings is to
demonstrate that, though Moltmann's method lies outside the paradigm
of liberation theology, the substantive nature of Moltmann's theology

dwells well within the framework of liberation theology
The practical concern of radical events of suffering can suggest the
problems of Moltmann's formal method in relation to liberation
theology. Liberation theology revolves around the question of suffering
and the quest of human freedom for justice, equality, freedom. Suffering
is a question of humanity and, in liberation theology, forces both the
relocation of human experience in an anthropology of praxis and the
reinterpretation of Christianity in light of a tradition in which God
chooses to be on the side of the oppressed.
But in Moltmann's formal method of theology, suffering does not raise
the question of humanity, let alone the practical question of human
activity For Moltmann, suffering is, first, the question of the appropriate
concept of God. Moltmann can offer, in this way, an answer to the
question of suffering by making God the measure and context of all
suffering. God's suffering -- more ultimate than any human suffering -can be understood and responded to only in faith: faith sees the glory of
the triune God in the faces and cries of the oppressed. This conceptual
answer, that suffering is in God and that God is the measure of all
suffering, in no way locates, measures, or answers massive unjust
suffering. Consequently the formal character of Moltmann's theology
misses the radical fact of suffering by moving too quickly from the
hopeless horrors of millions of innocent victims with no history and no
future into a concept of the Trinity. While it is naturally the task of
theology to be ever concerned with the concept of God, it is also always
the responsibility of theology to do so by giving an adequate account of
the present situation. The problem of radical events of suffering in the
Holocaust or in Latin America is not only that such suffering is
unthinkable in light of God, and vice versa, but also that history and the
human subject are practically threatened by such events.
As suffering is abstracted in Moltmann, so Christian praxis becomes a
privileged journey of faith. The location of suffering in God results in
placing the hermeneutical privilege not with the option for the poor or
with those who suffer within the paradigm of liberation theology, but in
the faithful, those gathered in God's church. Based on the unique event
of Jesus Christ that is untouched by human reason or social function, the
church is incapable of correlating other criticisms of injustice with its
own radical critique or of appropriating other models of transformation
in its own eschatological proclamation.
Moltmann's formal method of a dialectic of contradiction between God

and world, revelation and history, and church and society cannot deal
with the radical negativity of historical suffering or with the practical
activity of human history Moltmann constantly privileges the dialectic
of contradiction as the real interruption of history Suffering is thus
formally a vehicle for God's revelation: God chooses self-revelation in
the unlike (history) through the unlike of history (suffering).
Moltmann's formal method of a dialectic of contradiction refuses to take
history seriously, both in its radical interruption through events of
suffering and in its character of human praxis.
Nevertheless the substantive character of Moltmann's readings -- the
dialectic of identification of suffering and hope and of cross and
resurrection -- breaks through the narrow confines of his method. If
Moltmann fails to let suffering be interruptive and human history to be
practical, he succeeds in forcing us to think of God and suffering
together in light of a tradition that promises righteousness and justice
for all. The peculiar nature of promise as open history names the
horizon of human existence as one of anticipatory freedom. The event
of cross-resurrection names the identification of suffering and hope in
human praxis. The power of the Spirit graces the intersubjectivity of all
creation as a gift and as an imperative for human responsibility. If
Moltmann's texts can be read against his own formal method, the God
whose story is told creates possibilities in the impossible, identifies
hope and suffering, testifies through mission, witness, and its own
exodus. Moltmann reminds us that theology keeps this story central as
both its subject and its substance. But Moltmann also reminds us that
the new paradigm of liberation theology is a new way of doing
theology, a new way of talking about theology's subject and substance.
Moltmann provokes, in this text, an interpretation of liberation theology
as not only a theology in which human suffering and God are central,
but also a theology in which human suffering and God are related
through liberating praxis.
NOTES:
1. Jurgen Moltmann, "Political Theology," Theology Today 28 (April
1971):7.
2. Ibid.
3. Jurgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope, trans. James W Leitch (New
4. Ibid., pp. 50-58. For an excellent discussion of Barth's influence on
Moltmann, as well as a general introduction to Moltmann's theology,
see M. Douglas Meeks, Origins of the Theology of Hope (Philadelphia,
Pa.: Fortress Press, 1974).
6. Ibid., p. 30.
7. Jurgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the
Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology, trans. R. A. Wilson
and John Bowden (New York: Harper & Row, 1973), pp. 332-35.
8. Jurgen Moltmann, The
Future of Creation: Collected
Essays, trans. Margaret Kohl (Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press, 1979),

pp. 97-98.
10. Ibid., p. 84.
11. Ibid., p.85.
12. Ibid. Here the influence of Ernst Bloch is brought into relationship
with the influence of Karl Barth in Moltmann's theology. Although
Moltmann wants to make the resurrection a historical event and a
history-creating event, he wants it to transcend historical verification;
see A. D. Galloway, "The New Hegelians," Religious Studies 8
(1972):367-71.
14. Ibid., p. 86.
15. Ibid., pp. 124-33.

16. Ibid., pp. 133-38.
17. Christopher Morse, The Logic of Promise in Moltmann's Theology
19. Moltmann, Future of Creation, p. 29.
20. Morse, Logic of Promise, pp. 65-67.
21. Moltmann, "The Future as a New Paradigm of transcendence," in
Future of Creation, pp. 1-17.
22. Jurgen Moltmann, Religion, Revolution and the Future, trans. R. A.
Wilson and John Bowden (New York: Harper & Row, 1973), p. 195.
23. For criticisms of Moltmann's inability to affirm present religious
experience, see Langdon Gilkey, Reaping the Whirlwind: A Christian
Interpretation of History (New York: Seabury, 1976), pp. 233-36. For
Moltmann's inability to give norms and criteria for ethics, see James
Gustafson, Ethics from a Theocentric Perspective, Vol. I (Chicago, Ill.:
University of Chicago Press, 1981), pp. 43-48.
25. Ibid., p. 198.
26. Moltmann, Crucified God, pp. 112-14.
27. Ibid., p. 123.
28. Ibid., p. 126.
29. Ibid., p. 128.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid., p. 136.

32. Ibid., p. 114.
33. Ibid., p. 147. Moltmann executes some very poor biblical
scholarship when he makes statements such as "the flight of the
disciples can be regarded as historical, because it conflicts with any
kind of veneration for a hero and forebear," (p. 132).
34. Ibid., p. 148.
35. Ibid., p. 151.
36. Ibid., pp. 151-52.
37. Ibid., p. 171.
38. Ibid., p. 174.
39. Ibid., p. 185.
40. Ibid., pp. 217-27.
41. Ibid., p. 249. For Moltmann's distinctions on the forms of the
Trinity, see his The Trinity and the Kingdom: The Doctrine of God,
trans. Margaret Kohl (New York: Harper& Row, 1981).
42. Moltmann, Crucified God, p. 246. For a critical review of Moltmann
in relation to the occlusion of the Holocaust and Jewish suffering into a
preconceived idea of Christianity, see A. Roy Eckardt "Jurgen
Moltmann, the Jewish People and the Holocaust," Journal of the
American Academy of Religion 44 (December l976): 693-703.
43. Jurgen Moltmann, The Church in the Power of the Spirit: A
Contribution to Messianic Ecclesiology, trans. Margaret Kohl (New
York: Harper & Row, 1977), and The Passion for Life: A Messianic
Lifestyle, trans. M. Douglas Meeks (Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press,
1978).
45. Moltmann, Church in the Power of the Spirit, p. 127.

46. Ibid., p. 19.
48. Ibid., p. 320.
49. Moltmann's view of the church's critical relation to society is similar
to Metz's interpretation, in his second stage, of the church as a critical
institution.
50. Moltmann, Passion for Life, p. 117.
51. Ibid., pp. 37-49.
52. Ibid., p. 45.
16

Chopp
Chapter 7: Christ Liberating Culture

A new theology emerges out of Latin American liberation theology and
out of German political theology The contexts of these liberation
theologies introduce a new question: How does suffering change human
praxis and Christian witness? Following a rhetorical style of break and
rupture, liberation theologians argue for a new turn to praxis: a new way
of understanding human existence through practical activity and of
interpreting Christianity through its solidarity with those who suffer.
This "newness," which we have referred to as a paradigm shift, affects
theology both in its systematic interpretation (the particular way it
interprets human existence and Christian witness) and in its
methodological procedures (how it orders the investigation of and
reflection on human existence and Christian witness). Theological
method, the subject matter of the next chapter, attends to the nature and
process of investigation and reflection within the paradigm of liberation
theology. The systematic interpretation of existence and Christian
witness, the topic of this chapter, identifies new anthropological
categories and interprets Christian symbols within the paradigm of
liberation theology. This interpretation begins where liberation theology
begins: with attention to the massive, public events of suffering.1
The most fundamental claim of liberation theology is a bold one:
massive, public events of suffering rupture both our experiencing and
our understanding of history. Liberation theology forces us to view
suffering through the eyes of the angel in Walter Benjamin's
interpretation of Paul Klee's Angelus Novus:
A Klee painting named "Angelus Novus" shows an angel

looking as though he is about to move away from
something he is fixedly contemplating. His eyes are
staring, his mouth is open, his wings are spread. This is
how one pictures the angel of history. His face is turned
toward the past. Where we perceive a chain of events, he
sees one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage
upon wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet. The angel
would like to stay, and awaken the dead, and make whole
what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing from
Paradise; it has so caught in his wings with such violence
that the angel can no longer close them. This storm
irresistibly propels him into the future to which his back is
turned, while the pile of debris before him grows
skyward. This storm is what we call progress.2
Though we, mere mortals, cannot perceive the fullness of this horrified
angel's vision, we grasp with sudden insight that our modern liberal
notions of correction, evolution, and education are no longer possible as
final solutions to this catastrophic wreckage. With no hope of
eradicating suffering or of explaining history through one large Hegelian
sweep, we somberly recognize that the world is not getting better and
better. Even if we could in some way affirm that we understand history,
or if we could organize some plan to prevent all future suffering, the
catastrophic wreckage of our vision remains: the slate of history's
sufferings cannot be wiped clean.3 For, liberation theologians tell us,
suffering is our history, our confession, our human freedom, and our
human fate: only by realizing its centrality may we, in fact, face our own
lives as inhabitants of a particular time and space and as connected to
the rest of history.
The demand that we attend to the centrality of suffering catches us off
guard; what is most striking about this suffering is the necessity to speak
the unspeakable. How does one adequately describe the suffering and
torture of the poor in Latin America in a way that does not make the
poor an "object" of pity, of theories, of the process of history? How do
we understand the Holocaust -- what words fit an attempt to exterminate
a race of people?4 How do we contemplate a nuclear genocide of the
human species, an apocalyptic destruction that we ourselves create?
Suffering, as we have repeatedly indicated, has a nonidentity character
in reflection: it cannot be fully expressed in concepts or finally analyzed
in theoretical arguments. There is no way to correct or make right the
suffering of even one innocent victim, no theory to explain how one

human created by God is destroyed by another human.
We must, of course, understand that this is not a subtle new form of
negative ontology -- that the structure of life is suffering -- but that this
is a realistic, practical claim of life here and now. Indeed, to the despair
of some first-world academic theologians, liberation theologians have
shown little concern for philosophical reflection about the structure of
existence, preferring for the moment to concentrate on the urgent and
startling demands of the present historical situation. This is not,
however, to negate the importance of philosophical reflection;
significantly, current philosophical discussion is also marked by the
issues of polis, praxis, solidarity, and freedom.5 Though liberation
theology and the current "practical" philosophical discussion have yet to
engage each other in conversation, the themes and goals of
contemporary theology and practical philosophy share much in
common. At present the parallel between discussions on both the
foundation of praxis and the role of practical reason point to a central
fact: suffering demands a response not only of specific acts or
theoretical concepts, but also of interpretations, judgments, and
transformations centered on human praxis.6
It is, therefore, significant that in liberation theology this practical
concern of suffering is neither the call for a new ethic nor a sublation of
theology into ethics. Suffering, liberation theology claims, ruptures our
categories, our experiences, our history; suffering demands a new
paradigm for interpreting existence and Christian witness. We must, in
this paradigm, address ourselves to a new question, a question that we
cannot fit into our old frameworks of experiencing and understanding, a
question that is not quieted by our old answers.7 This question, the
question of suffering, functions in liberation theology to demand new
interpretations and understandings, new ways of conceiving and
answering questions, new ways of ordering questions and concerns.
What is at stake in the arguments of the liberation theologians is the very
character of human existence and Christianity or, in their language, a
radical conversion of anthropology, Christianity, and theology.
Liberation theology, however, must not only demand an anthropological
revolution and a messianic Christianity, but also provide new categories
for its anthropology of praxis and new interpretations of traditional
Christian symbols for its praxis of solidarity with those who suffer.8
Somewhat rephrased, liberation theology must not only proclaim the
passing of an old paradigm and the identification of new needs and

questions, but also formulate new constructs within the new paradigm.
Final interpretations are, of course, possible only at the end of a
theological era and not at its beginning; so we must enter this systematic
interpretation, remembering that the theological language we hear in
liberation theology is still searching for its full voice. With this
condition in mind, then, it is time to consider the constructive
formulations of the new paradigm of liberation theology.
HUMAN EXISTENCE: AN ANTHROPOLOGY OF PRAXIS
One of the more interruptive qualities about suffering, so liberation
theologians suggest, is that it makes us question our basic assumptions
about life; the turn to suffering forces us both to live differently and to
understand life differently. Within liberation theology this new form of
human existence is often formulated in opposition to the anthropology
of modern theology. Liberation theology argues that the subject of
modern Western theology is "man," more specifically, the white male of
modern Western societies. In privileging this subject, theology not only
focuses on a small, albeit powerful, group in history, but also functions
ideologically to shield the interests of these few from the demands of the
masses. Yet this is not to assume that this "special" subject enjoys a
perfect existence, for, as the German political theologians argue, the
privilege of power is bought at the cost of isolation, miserliness, and
apathy, the effects of which can be readily observed, as Metz points out:
"on the one hand, widespread apathy and, on the other, unreflecting
hatred; on the one hand, fatalism, and on the other, fanaticism."9
If liberation theology is critical of the choice of the subject, it is equally
critical of the manner in which modern theology has interpreted the
chosen few. Modern theology, goes the accusation, not only
conveniently chooses a particular, powerful subject, but then focuses on
this subject as an isolated individual, somehow untouched by the
political, social, and economic dimensions of life. Individualism leads to
the concern for historicity, the lonely individual inwardly dealing with
being toward death; a historicity that, as Georg Lukacs noted, is not
really distinguishable from ahistoricity.10 As Gutierrez points out, the
categories of modern theological anthropology are part and parcel of the
situatedness of modern theology, a situation in which individualism and
rationalism function as the foundation of politics and economics as well
as of knowledge.11
Freedom, another category of modern anthropology, has been the

special concern of theology since modernity threw off the oppressive
chains of religion to become "free," and religion in turn blessed this
freedom as a religious act. Freedom, in modern theological
anthropology, is structured through the dual categories of rationalism
(the freedom to examine the conditions of thought) and individualism
(the existential freedom to give assent to God). Liberation theology
argues that freedom, in modernity, never took seriously the second
challenge of the Enlightenment, the challenge to make a better world.
Indeed, the Enlightenment act of defiance against traditional authorities
and feudal society gave birth to the oppression of the many by the
control of the few.
Against the bourgeois subject, liberation theology listens to a new
subject who suffers: these are the subjects on the underside, on the
margins, in death itself. These subjects are not written about in
biographies or schoolbooks; these subjects are not filmed in soap operas
or movies of mass culture; these subjects are not studied in the
ruminations of a narcissistic society. Though they have no objective
records, these subjects have faces, stories, and testimonies. These faces,
as the Latin American bishops at Puebla announced, are the subject for
liberation theology: -- the faces of young children, struck down by
poverty before they are born. . .; -- the faces of the indigenous peoples,
and frequently of the Afro-Americans as well, living marginalized lives
in inhuman situations . . . -- the faces of the peasants; as a social group,
they live in exile almost everywhere on our continent . . . -- the faces of
marginalized and overcrowded urban dwellers, whose lack of material
goods is matched by the ostentatious display of wealth by other
segments of society; -- the faces of old people, who are growing more
numerous every day, and who are frequently marginalized in a progressoriented society that totally disregards people not engaged in
production.12
These faces include the faces of the "other," the object of modernity's
project of extermination in the Holocaust: "in the camps men and
women were reduced to a single human mass. They all looked alike -the same filthy rags, shaved heads, stick-thin festering bodies -- and the
same hurt and need was each other's lot," wrote Terrence Des Pres.13
These are the faces that must now be brought to the focal center of
anthropology and related to new, fundamental categories for
understanding human existence.
The center of this new anthropology is, as we have already seen, the
subject of suffering, where suffering is related to oppression and
injustice in the disasters of history. We shall later examine the argument
for the privileging of the oppressed subject based on a reading of
Christian tradition, but for now we must understand that this other
subject, or the subject as "other," is representative of humanity. That is
to say, the choice of the sufferer as the referent to understand human
existence is not only for the sake of the mere survival of the overlooked
and oppressed, but also for the sake of the practical realization of human
existence. Liberation theology depends on this wager: only by
understanding the subject of suffering can we hope to understand
adequately the present reality of human existence and to transform the
polis for the benefit of all its members. The argument for the privileging
of the oppressed as the central subject in theological anthropology is
twofold: (1) attention to the subjects of suffering "ruptures" or breaks
into the ideological distortion of privileging the private and individual
bourgeois subject as the "universal" or "common" subject, and (2) the
position of the subject of suffering locates the most adequate place in
which to understand the interrelationships of the present situation. Note
that both of these arguments are themselves practical claims, arguing
that, in this situation, the subject of suffering has a privileged location
both in repositioning theological anthropology to interpret human
existence and in giving theological anthropology a new vision of the
past, present, and future of history.
As suffering can be said to relocate the subject, so praxis can be said to
redefine anthropology. For, in the arguments of liberation theology, it is
only by reconceiving the human subject through praxis that we may
respond to suffering. As the referent for a new anthropology, praxis may
be defined as human activity, and understood through a retrieval of
certain themes in the works of Aristotle and Marx.
The classical understanding of praxis goes back to Aristotle and is
connected to the terms "episteme" and "poesis." "Praxis" refers to the
sphere of human action in the virtuous life of the citizen in the polis.
"Episteme," or theory, studies the eternal order and is the knowledge of
the unchanging. "Poesis," or "techne," governs the production of human
artifacts. Compared to abstract theory, praxis depends on the changing
needs of human community; compared to poesis, praxis anticipates the
telos of human realization. Praxis is action, but action within the context
of human community, a human community that has the responsibility
for its own political determination. Praxis is not just any action; rather, it
is the ongoing activity of a human community responsible for itself.

In the thought of Marx, praxis is the societal foundation of all life and
knowledge. Marx argued that all values, norms, structures, and systems
are related to the structure of society, thus suggesting the possibility for
a "practical" epistemology and the necessity of critical theory. Marx
offered the outlines of an anthropology in which the human subject is
constituted by and constitutes society. Richard Bernstein describes
Marx's anthropology: "Marx had a profound understanding of the ways
in which men are what they do, of how their social praxis shapes and is
shaped by the complex web of historical institutions and practices
within which they function and work."14 For Marx, praxis meant the
possibility and the necessity of transformation within the reproductive
nature of human agency and social structures.
The anthropology of liberation theology, in sum, emphasizes practical
activity. It draws upon Aristotle's notion of praxis in which human
agency is always related to a community and practically oriented. But
the anthropology of liberation theology transforms this understanding in
light of Marx's conception of praxis stressing the structural relations
within society, the realities of ideological and systematic distortion, and
the necessity for social and personal transformations. The anthropology
of praxis in liberation theology can be examined through the
identification of three categories: the political nature, the intersubjective
character, and the anticipatory freedom of human existence.
Praxis necessitates that human existence can be understood adequately
through attention to the full historical character of existence: covering
the broadest horizon of existence, this can be called the political nature
of anthropology. The word "political" is used in liberation theology to
refer to the activity of life in human community. For some liberation
theologians the political nature of anthropology implies attention to
specific events in concrete communities. It is not enough to interpret the
Holocaust or the poor in general; one must look at a specific group at a
specific time in Auschwitz or investigate a particular basic Christian
community working for a particular project. For others, it may entail
considering existence through the larger lens of social reality by
attending to the ongoing interpretations of traditions, to different
candidates for cultural criticism and understanding, and to various
models of transformation. The political nature of human existence
demands a practical interpretation, and "practical" refers not only to
applications of theories to specific situations, but also to the practical
knowledge of the agents participating in the ongoing production and

reproduction of human activity. Whatever the particular stance taken,
the goal is to understand human existence in its actual historical
constitution, that is, in its political nature.
That human existence must be understood politically has, for liberation
theology, many implications. First, it means that theology must
understand human existence through broad historical perspectives. To
be a human, given the political nature of existence, is to be historical,
born of a certain time a~d place, in a country, within a family and a
social system. To be a historical human subject is to experience the
temporality of having a past, a present, and a future: it is to have a
history--to have traditions, memories, experiences, and hopes. It also
means that the human is part of a larger history, a history that goes
beyond one's personal life and exists through social institutions. The
historical nature of the human subject forces us to understand the subject
in and through time and space: to understand temporality through the
long duration of social institutions, through the ongoing participation of
communities and individuals in traditions, and through the existential
activity of human experience; and to understand spatiality through
particular geographical locations, within particular social relations, and
in particular cultural horizons.
Second, the political nature also implies the need for a wide range of
theories for interpretation and transformation to understand historical
existence. This is not to replace theological anthropology's common
conversation partners of philosophy and psychology with sociology and
economics; it is, rather, the demand that theology must use a multiplicity
of theories to understand human existence in any given situation. The
third implication of the political nature is an explicitly normative
implication: any visions or models of human fulfillment must be
articulated through the polis.15 Models of fulfillment or strategies of
change in anthropology must consider both individual actors and
structural relations. Human existence must be understood and
transformed through the interdependency of human agency and social
structures.
The anthropology of praxis also considers the intersubjective character
of human existence, in which life is, at every dimension and level,
communal. We think and know the world through language, which is
and has a communal structure. Our culture, its values and symbols,
belong not to any one individual, but to a tradition and to a community
that span generations and include many diverse interpretations. We are

dependent upon others globally, nationally, and interpersonally for our
needs and desires, our identities and our continuities. Even the "I" of our
personal life forms and grows only in relation to others. Beneath and
between human existence lies a dependence on an "always already"
reality of solidarity in nature.
In part this category of intersubjectivity comes from the fact that the
subject of liberation theology is a group of oppressed: the poor, women,
ethnic minorities. In part it arises out of the understanding of the radical
interrelatedness of human existence. It is, as well, formulated against the
lonely individual "I," and the fear that this "I" has been erected on the
backs of others. But we must be clear that the category of
intersubjectivity is not a plea for a reductionist form of social theory.
Liberation theology, even in its more demonstrative critiques, cannot
argue that human existence is simply determined by impersonal social
forces. Indeed, the emphasis on conscientization, the pleas for
conversion, and the notion of liberation appeal to an awakening of
individual and social consciousness as well as to the need for personal
and political transformations. In more classical terms, theological
anthropology opts neither to convert only the individual in hopes of
stacking society with righteous citizens nor to restructure society merely
to guarantee better individuals.
Most peculiarly, the category of intersubjectivity in liberation theology
means that we must recognize a present solidarity with the dead. If we
are connected to the past through our traditions, our institutions, our
systems, we are also connected to the past through our solidarity with
the dead.16 Indeed, our connection with history depends not on our own
willingness to read the texts of the past, but on an ontological and
practical solidarity with those who have lived and died before us. The
dead make a claim on us, giving us a vision and a goal for the future as
well as a history and an identity from the past. The intersubjective
character of human existence necessitates, for liberation theology, that
we must reread our history in order to have a future, that we must
recreate our freedom out of the possibilities of the past. Intersubjectivity
demands that an adequate understanding of human existence will
depend on a continual rereading of history, a continual conversation
with our ancestors for the sake of ourselves and our children.
Theological anthropology also considers the future in terms of the
anticipatory freedom of human existence. Indeed, it is the solidarity of
human existence in liberation theology that is the condition for the

possibility of freedom. Freedom is the capacity for new action, for
transformation, for changing the present status of a community. This
understanding is expressed in words of the political philosopher Hannah
Arendt: "before it became an attribute of thought or a quality of the will,
freedom was understood to be the free man's status, which enabled him
to move, to get away from home, to go out into the world and meet other
people in deed and word."17 The anticipatory freedom of human
existence identifies the projection of future possibilities, the "going out
into the world" as the definitive act of being human. The experience of
time, how we live in history and make history, is channeled by
liberation theologians through the character of anticipatory freedom:
freedom is human activity toward a new future.18 To be human is to
make, to create, and to live out new ways of being human in history.
Anticipatory freedom is, of course, both social and personal, with both
an indicative claim -- every one and every institution lives toward the
future -- and an imperative mandate: we must live toward the future. An
adequate understanding of human existence requires not only the
interpretation of the here and now -- the facts of a situation -- but also
the identification of transformative possibilities for the future. Theories
of interpretation must include theories of transformation, or in Marxist
terms, every "is" implies some "ought." These theories of
transformation, as theories of interpretation, will include a wide variety
of disciplines, Positions, and resources. Psychology, sociology,
education, philosophy, ecology, economics: a diversity of fields will
contribute a variety of synchronic and diachronic models to aid in
understanding and transforming existence."19
Invoking the descriptive adjective of their name, many liberation
theologians understand the anticipatory freedom of the human subject to
be a location for religious experience. Moltmann's interpretation of hope
as futur and zukunft locates the immediacy of God's mysterious
relationship to human spirituality in anticipatory freedom.20 Gutierrez
suggests, most strongly of all, that utopia mediates liberating activity in
the experience of God's redemptive activity. What is significant in these
various claims is that the anticipatory freedom of human existence is a
new location for the experience of God.21 God is not just revealed in the
Scriptures and witnessed to by the community, but is also experienced
in a solidarity with the poor that anticipates new ways of being
human.22
Liberation theology formulates an anthropology of praxis through the

categories of the political nature, the intersubjective character, and the
anticipatory freedom of human existence. These categories do not
compose the totality of an adequate anthropology; other categories and
other issues must also contribute to theological anthropology. But these
categories do indicate the fundamentals of a new anthropology,
suggesting that any understanding of human existence must at least
begin in or be in reference to praxis. This anthropology of praxis shares
themes in common with some new interpretations of human existence in
contemporary philosophy and social theory. As Richard Bernstein's
book Beyond Objectivism and Relativism indicates, praxis is one of the
central themes of contemporary theory with notions of solidarity,
freedom, and the polls as constant subthemes.23 A more guarded
observation is made by the political philosopher Fred Dallmayr: "on a
still broader scale, it is possible to discern a subtle shift involving a
progressive deemphasis of epistemology in favor of pragmatic or
practical preoccupation."24 The new anthropology betrays liberation
theology's participation in the global community that needs and desires a
practical understanding of human existence. But liberation theology is
by no means a mere reflection of the contemporary discussion; its
anthropology develops out of and influences a new interpretation of
Christian witness. This anthropology of praxis joins with a new reading
of Christianity in light of a God who creates, redeems, and liberates
history.
CHRIST AND SOLIDARITY
Liberation theology is a new interpretation of Christian tradition; it
seeks to recover or to uncover the symbols, the narratives, and the
dogmas of Christian tradition forgotten or distorted by modern theology.
Christianity, one might argue along with liberation theology, got lost
among the arid plains of the Enlightenment and the shifting sands of
secularism; with the prophetic desire of returning to tradition via a new
form of Christianity, liberation theologians proclaim nothing less than a
new way of Christianity.
The irruption of the poor, Gutierrez argues, has resulted in a new way of
Christianity that is qualitatively different from former ways. Metz calls
for a messianic Christianity to replace the bourgeois religion
masquerading as Christianity in the first world.25 This newness that
Gutierrez and Metz emphasize entails the way in which Christian faith is
experienced and understood. This new way of faith is a relocation of
Christianity in activity, with faith being understood not primarily

through beliefs, doctrines, or individual feelings but through praxis.
Christianity is now understood as the activity of a community: the
formation of individuals and communities; the living out of tradition and
the projection of future possibilities; and the witness of teaching,
mission, evangelism, worship, education, and service. This relocation of
Christianity in activity does not deny the reality of personal beliefs or of
personal religious experience, but places the personal always in relation
to the communal.
Yet Christianity is not just any activity, for the placement of faith in
human activity takes on a particular content in light of suffering. It could
be said that suffering not only ruptures Christianity by relocating it in
the activity of a community, but also reforms Christianity by
reinterpreting it as a praxis of solidarity with those who suffer. Or in
words reminiscent of Metz: suffering not only interrupts, it converts
Christianity into an interruption -- an interruption of systems that deny
suffering or try to find a total cure for suffering; an interruption of
structures that attempt to control rather than transform history; an
interruption of theories that deny the dangerous memories and
transformative narratives of cultural traditions.26
Within this interpretation turned interruption and transformation,
liberation theology retrieves and reinterprets Christian symbols. These
symbols relate to the root metaphor of liberation with its tensive
character: the constant multiplicity of meanings in the term "liberation"
gives rise to new and transformative relations. "Liberation" covers
particular acts, utopian visions, and the fullness of redemption. The
nature of history, the fulfillment of humanity, and the telos of social
relations can all be related to the term "liberation." Liberation discloses
God's originary act of creation as well as God's continuing activity in
history; it names Christ's identification of cross and resurrection, of
suffering and hope; it invokes the Spirit's guiding, breaking, rupturing,
healing, and transforming movement throughout history.
Two aspects of liberation theology's play of this root metaphor within
Christian symbols must be observed. First, because of liberation
theology's status as a paradigm shift in theology and because of its
incorporation of ideology critique into the nature of theology, symbols
are retrieved through a "hermeneutics of suspicion." Liberation theology
reinterprets tradition with special attention to the systematic distortions
within the tradition and the legitimizing use of symbols in creating false
ideologies.27 Second, because of the transformative orientation of

human existence and Christian tradition, symbols are understood not
only as disclosing reality, that is, representing the way things are, but
also as liberating and transforming reality, namely, anticipating new
possibilities and future aspirations.28
Although a full reading of Christian symbols in liberation theology is
beyond the limits of this book, a brief sketch of the reinterpretation of
Christian tradition can be drawn by beginning with the symbol of sin.
Traditionally, sin has been understood as the fallenness of all creation,
the inability to be or do what God intended -- caused, of course, by the
willful turning away from God. Sin has been primarily understood as
personal: the dark night of the soul, the agony of the individual in doubt,
fear, or confusion, and the struggle for control over appetites and
desires. It should be no surprise that liberation theology is critical of the
privatism and individualism that results when sin is interpreted in
personal terms; for liberation theologians sin must be understood as the
distortion of human existence in its political nature, its intersubjective
character, and its anticipatory orientation toward the future.29
Sin results in suffering, the suffering of creation groaning in travail, the
suffering of children without any hope. Sin manifests and embraces
suffering, the suffering of lost identity, the suffering of freedom without
a future, and the suffering of a future without freedom. Sin extracts its
price as the victimization of the poor, the suffering of the tortured, the
dispossession of the homeless. These are victims of sin not because of
moral inferiority or human depravity, but because they bear the brunt
and carry the special burden of the world's sin. In the retrieval of this
symbol, sin's arena is human praxis and its primary realization is
massive global injustice.
Following the traditional correlation of sin with redemption, liberation
theology reinterprets redemption to include the realization of the claims
on history of all those who suffer, both the living and the dead.
Redemption includes the possibility of just structures as well as the
entire transfiguration of history. Redemption, referring to the radically
new in history and the transformation of the present, is the fulfillment of
God's creation, the making new of the distorted, the new creation of
history.
If redemption has to do with political reality, then it is mediated or made
real in concrete situations of liberation as well as through a utopian
vision of history. If redemption conquers sin, then it liberates the

oppressed, feeds the poor, breaks through false consciousness, and
offers new possibilities for being human in history. For many liberation
theologians, the vision of redemption is expressed in the parable of
Judgment in Matthew 25, with the feeding of the hungry, the clothing of
the naked, and the visiting of the imprisoned. Redemption must be
related, though never equated, with liberation; to equate redemption
with any one situation of liberation would be to usurp the power of God
and deny the openness of human existence. But not to realize the
relation of redemption and liberation is to deny the grace of God and the
nature of human existence. God's redemptive activity is neither any one
historical event nor simply the telos of all historical activity. In its
fullness a mystery, redemption is the praxis of God; God acts in history
through liberating activity, but God's liberating activity is not yet total
redemption.
Biblically, liberation theology unites creation and redemption through
the interpretation of God's providential role in history as liberating
activity.30 Within the Old Testament, the exodus and the prophets are
frequently favored by liberation theologians to suggest the importance
of freedom and the struggle for liberation as central to God's activity in
history. As a founding event, the exodus discloses God as a God of
people in history, interrelated through familial, religious, social,
political, and economic systems. The prophets criticize present social
systems in relation to the promises, memories, and traditions of the
people and reveal God as one who demands righteousness and justice.
In the New Testament, liberation theologians highlight sections such as
the Beatitudes, finding within such sections God's identification with
those who suffer. Gutierrez claims that the biblical option for the poor is
first a word about God: "the beatitudes in the Gospels -- Blessed are the
poor -- are not, in the first instance, a word about the poor, but about
God. 'Blessed are the poor is a revelation of God.'"31
God's liberating activity in history has, for liberation theologians, a
particular incarnation or a "coming into flesh" through Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ announces his mission as a message of grace in history,
displaying God's gratuitous activity in the option for those who suffer
and the identification of this suffering with Christ's own promise of
future life in the resurrection. As sign and presence, Christ is the
incarnation of God's solidarity with those who suffer and the promise of
freedom and righteousness for all creation in God's still-hidden future.
As in the tradition of the church, there are many images of Christ in

liberation theology.32 Christ is seen as a "moral leader," a political
revolutionary, a teacher, and certainly a political rebel. New readings of
Christ as a martyr, as a sacrifice, as a bringer of God's grace are offered
in the many liberation Christologies. Liberation theologians view Christ
in profoundly new ways: Christ judges sin, empties out God's love, rules
the cosmos, and suffers as the tortured and scourged of the earth.
Popular culture, ancient symbols, and church teachings are transformed
into symbols of the liberating Christ. But, for liberation theology, Christ
is fundamentally the revelation of God's grace in solidarity with those
who suffer.33 The narrative of Christ discloses the identification of hope
and suffering, of cross and resurrection, of God and those who suffer as
always together. As the ultimate revelation of God, Jesus mediates the
kingdom of God: as for much of the Christian tradition, Jesus comes not
to announce himself, but to announce the kingdom.
Through Christ as the revelation of God, Christianity becomes a way of
the kingdom in its praxis of solidarity with those who suffer. It is a
graced way, for Jesus Christ reveals the gratuitous gift of God's
salvation through love of neighbor. It is the nature and purpose of the
church to continue the incarnation as the full embodiment of God's love
in the world through the announcement of the kingdom in the midst of
suffering, death, and hope. The church continues the witness of the
kingdom of God through the power of the Spirit as the sacrament of
God's activity.
Through liberation theology's hermeneutics of suspicion, liberation
theologians criticize earlier formulations and functions of the symbol of
the church. Moltmann, for instance, criticizes the church in the first
world as a Noah's ark of individualism, and Metz accuses the bourgeois
church of clinging to a paternalistic control of masses.34 The
hermeneutics of retrieval comes, Gutierrez suggests, through the parable
of the Banquet. In this dangerous memory, the master, after the invited
guests refuse to attend the feast, goes out into the Street to invite the
outcasts.35 The uninvited of history attend, and thus they are the guests
of the kingdom. And so the church must be understood and transformed
by the uninvited of history; it must become not a church for the
oppressed but of the oppressed. Existing for others as it criticizes unjust
social systems, the church speaks out against oppression and works for
political and personal transformation; it worships God as it serves the
poor and the oppressed by being a place for education, for new
relationships, for conscientization, and for exploring new ways of being
in the world. This is the witness of the church, a trial for its own
martyrdom before God and the world in its solidarity with those who
suffer.
The liberation of suffering thus ruptures and transforms Christianity.
What is important in this new reading of the Christian tradition is the
identification of Christian witness with the liberation of those who
suffer. Liberation theology is, in a sense, a new language of God -- a
language created by the reinterpretation of old symbols in new situations
-- and the demand that only by this reformation can Christianity
maintain its tradition. The new interpretation of Christianity on behalf of
liberation theology is an act of loyalty and thanksgiving to a God who
creates, redeems, and liberates all of history.
CHRIST AND CULTURE
Having a new anthropology and a new interpretation of Christianity, we
can address now the practical relation between Christianity and culture.
The relation might be posed through a question that has always puzzled
Christians: How should Christianity relate to culture? Throughout the
history of the Christian church, Christians have proposed different
answers to this question of how Christians live in the world.
Traditionally, Christianity has related to the world either by following a
model of Christ against culture or by following a model of some
relation of Christ and culture. Another way to interpret the many
different answers in the tradition is to focus on the institutional nature of
the church: Christianity has lived in the world through the institutions of
the sect or the church.36 In the sect, Christian life is opposed to and
withdrawn from the culture; in the church, Christian life discovers some
form of identity with the culture. Though the sect has never been
completely free from the world and the church never completely
identified with the world, neither the option of the sect nor the option of
the church operates within the paradigm of liberation theology. For
liberation theology's relation to culture is not formulated on the grounds
of identity and nonidentity between Christianity and culture, but on the
possibilities of identification and liberation; it suggests a new
relationship of liberating activity between Christianity and world.
Liberation theology proposes a new model to answer our question: a
model of Christ liberating culture.
This relationship of liberating activity is dependent upon liberation
theology's insistence on suffering as the primary focus for theology and
on the creation of new and more just ways of living together as the goal
of theology. The crisis of the subject -- which is the practical quest for
human self-realization -- must become, liberation theologians insist, the
crisis of Christianity. Furthermore, the practical quest for justice is the
particular concern of Christianity as a praxis of solidarity with those
who suffer. Obviously, in the reading of the tradition by liberation
theologians, Christ liberates culture as the transformative revelation of
God's freedom in history; Christianity is the way of following or
imitating Christ in liberating activity in the world. The model for the
new relation of Christianity and culture is Christ liberating culture, a
model that is formed and transformed by suffering, praxis, and
liberation.
Liberation theology offers the model of Christ liberating culture as a
practical correlation between the quest for human justice and the
Christian praxis of solidarity with those who suffer. Within this practical
correlation, Christianity represents the anticipatory freedom of the
human subject. This practical correlation -- that Christianity
transformatively represents the human quest for freedom -- has been
woven through this text. Indeed, the argument for this practical
correlation suggests the paradigm shift of liberation theology as a
transformation of modern theology. Modern theology has long been
concerned about the freedom of the human subject as fulfillment of the
human and the location of relation to God; liberation theology creates a
new paradigm by forcing this freedom to be fully political -- the quest of
freedom and justice meets the religious quest of liberation and
redemption.
This model of Christ liberating culture depends on two specific
theological arguments that are increasingly important for liberation
theologians. The reason Christians relate to culture in the liberating
praxis of solidarity with those who suffer, the first argument goes, is
because of God's option for the oppressed. Gutierrez, as we have already
seen, formulates this as a hermeneutical privilege wherein the Bible
reveals God's option for the poor.
The love of God is a gratuitous gift. It was the intuition of Luther when
he translated and understood the famous text in the Epistle to the
Romans, 3:28, as justification by sola fide. Sola is not in the text, but it
is in the meaning of this text because it is the affirmation of the gratuity
of the action of God. Loving by preference the poor, doing that, God
reveals this gratuity. And by consequence as followers of Jesus Christ,
we must also do this preferential option for the poor. That is the main
reason -- the God of our faith, the God of Jesus Christ.37
Christ liberating culture as the model of the relationship of Christianity
to the world depends on this understanding of God; the relationship of
liberating praxis is a theological interpretation of the meaning and truth
of the Christian tradition.
The second argument for the model of Christ liberating culture identifies
justice as a primary analogue for faith.38 Faith, for liberation theology,
sets us free -- from sin and for God and world. Freedom has been
interpreted, across the Christian tradition, as the love of God and
neighbor, the two commandments given by Jesus. If faith itself is now
constituted and mediated through history, love of God and neighbor
must include responsibility for the whole of God's creation. As Schubert
Ogden has observed: Because nothing of ourselves is to be withheld
from our love for God, all of our powers and all of the uses of our
powers are regulated by this single commandment. Nor is this in any
way qualified by the fact that there is also the second commandment
that we are to love our neighbor as ourselves. On the contrary, because
God's own love boundlessly includes all our neighbors as well as
ourselves, the second commandment but makes explicit what is
implicitly contained in the first. As a matter of fact, it is precisely by
withholding nothing of ourselves from our love for our neighbors as
well as for all of our fellow creatures that we can alone obey the first
commandment.39
Faith and love, in liberation theology, are joined with the practice of
justice as the exemplification of responsibility for freedom. Justice
refers to new ways of being human that are, in the discernment and
judgment of the members of the polis, the best possible ways for all.
Faith works through love in the bringing about of human justice through
structural and personal change.
Christianity relates to the world through the liberating activity of
solidarity. This includes the denunciation of oppressive structures and
the conscientization of the oppressed. Christianity must criticize that
which oppresses the human subject, from cultural values to global
exchange, from nuclear arms to the writing of history, from language to
economic systems. Christianity works for liberation by participating in
new systems and structures, by suggesting alternative ways of being in
the world, and by enabling persons to be and to do in history. But
Christianity carries forth this praxis not as an implication of its faith, not
as a time-filling device, and not as liberal charity, but as the very
constitution of faith, the mysterious experiencing of God, and the
following of Jesus Christ.
From the vantage point of Christ liberating culture, we can conclude that
liberation theology offers a new understanding of human existence and a
new interpretation of Christianity. Within this paradigm of Christ
liberating culture comes a new way of conceiving and constructing
theology. Theology comes second, the liberation theologians remind us,
reflecting upon faith and human experience. To this second act, which
has been making its presence felt throughout the text, we now turn in the
following chapter.
NOTES:
1. The model of "Christ liberating culture" is intended as a sixth model
to the five models proposed by H. Richard Niebuhr in Christ and
Culture (New York: Harper & Row, 1951). The term "culture" refers to
the total constitution of the polis.
2. Walter Benjamin, illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry
Zohn (New York: Schocken Books, 1969), pp. 257-58.
3. For one theological interpretation of the need for anamnestic
solidarity as universal solidarity, see Helmut Peukert, Science, Action,
and Fundamental Theology; To ward a Theology of Communicative
Action, trans. James Bohman (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1984).
4. Arthur Cohen, The Tremendum (New York: Crossroad Publishing
Co., 1981), p. 7. Cohen notes the debasement of language that occurred
in the Nazi era, with the extermination of the Jews articulated in terms
of "disinfecting" and "purifying," thus avoiding words such as
"murdering" and "killing."
5. Contemporary works on "praxis" are numerous. To cite a few: KarlOtto Apel, Towards a Transformation of Philosophy, trans. Glyn Adey
and David Frisby (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980); Jurgen
Habermas, Communication and the Evolution of Society, trans. Thomas
McCarthy (Boston, Mass.: Beacon Press, 1979); Richard Rorty,

Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1979).
6. Both contemporary philosophical discussions and liberation theology
might well agree to Marx's Second Thesis on Feuerbach: "the question
whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a
question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth,
that is, the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in
practice," "Theses on Feuerbach," in The Marx-Engels Reader, ed.
Robert C. Tucker (New York: W. W. Norton, 1972), p. 144.
7. The shift from liberal to neo-orthodox theology occurred, in part,
because the questions of despair and meaningfulness could not be asked
as primary questions within the paradigm of liberal theology. Likewise,
the question of suffering and liberation -- with the attending issues of
praxis, justice, and ideology critique -- cannot, liberation theologians
argue, be formulated adequately within modern theology.
8. Of course, liberation theologians must always introduce arguments
for the adequacy of their analysis and the appropriateness of their
theological interpretations; see Jose Miguez Bonino, Toward a
Christian Political Ethics (Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress Press, 1983), p. 9.
9. Johann Baptist Metz, Faith in History and Society, trans. David Smith
(New York: Seabury Press, 1980), p. 172.
10. For contrasting interpretations of the notion of historicity in
Heidegger, see Terry Eagleton, Literary Theory: An Introduction
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1983), pp. 61-66, who
uses the line from Lukacs; and Fred Dallmayr, "Ontology of Freedom:
Heidegger and Political Philosophy," in Polis and Praxis, (Cambridge,
Mass.: MIT Press, 1984), pp. 104-32, who argues that Heidegger
formulates an ontology of freedom wherein freedom is the ground for
human solidarity.
R. Barr (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1983), p. 175.
12. Puebla and Beyond, ed. John Eagleson and Philip Scharper
(Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1979), pars. 32-39.
13. Terrence Des Pres, The Survivor (London: Oxford University Press,
1976), p. 37.
14. Richard J. Bernstein, Praxis and Action: Contemporary
Philosophies of Human Activity (Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania Press, 1971), p. 306.
15. David Tracy, "The Foundations of Practical Theology," in Practical
Theology: The Emerging Field in Theology, Church, and World, ed.
Don Browning (New York: Harper & Row, 1983), pp. 76-77.
16. For an interpretation of the importance of this theme in Marx and
Benjamin, see Christopher Lenhardt, "Anamnestic Solidarity: Proletariat
and Its Manes," Telos 25 (Fall l975):133-54.
17. Hannah Arendt, Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in
Political Thought (New York: Meridian Books, 1963), p. 148.
18. Metz strongly emphasizes the need for a new understanding of time,
which should include both a new understanding of the nature and
purpose of history and a new understanding of human freedom and
solidarity; see Metz, Faith in History and Society, pp. 175-76.
19. Tracy, "Foundations of Practical Theology," pp. 76-77.
20. Jurgen Moltmann, "The Future as a New Paradigm of
Transcendence," in The Future of Creation, trans. Margaret Kohl
21. Gustavo Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, trans. and ed. Sister
Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1973),
pp. 232-39.
22. In other words, most liberation theologians argue for some type of
"religious experience" in the anticipation of the future through solidarity
with others.
23. Richard J. Bernstein, Beyond Objectivism and Relativism
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983), especially pp.
109-231.
24. Dallmayr, Polls and Praxis, p. 1.

25. Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation, p. 108; Johann Baptist Metz, The
Emergent Church, trans. Peter Mann (New York: Crossroad Publishing
Co., 1981), pp. 1-16.
26. Johann Baptist Metz, Unterbrechungen (Gutersloh: Mohn, 1981).
27. See Gutierrez, Theology of Liberation, pp. 287-302; Jurgen
Moltmann, Theology of Hope, trans. James W Leitch (New York:
Harper & Row, 1967), pp. 50-76.
28. Biblical symbols, in the words of Langdon Gilkey, "challenge the
way we concretely are, they call for a new way of being, a new attitude
to ourselves and to others, new forms of our actual relations in
community and a new kind of action in the world" Reaping the
Whirlwind: A Christian Interpretation of History (New York: Seabury,
1976), p. 138.
30. J. Andrew Kirk, Liberation Theology (Atlanta, Ga.: John Knox
Press, 1979), p. 111.
31. Gustavo Gutierrez, "Theology and Spirituality in a Latin American
Context," Harvard Divinity Bulletin 14 (June-August 1984):4.
32. For one expression of the many christological images in liberation
theology, see Jose Miguez Bonino, ed., Faces of Jesus: Latin American
Christologies, trans. Robert R. Barr (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books,
1984).
33. The point is not so much that Jesus consciously intended a particular
revolution or realized any one particular way of life but, rather, that
Jesus is the revelation of God. Said differently: the historical
reconstruction of Jesus is not equal to the christological representation
of Jesus. In the words of Schubert Ogden, the point is that "the meaning
of Jesus for us is precisely the possibility of the existence of freedom,"
The Point of Christology (New York: Harper & Row, 1982), p. 122.
34. Moltmann, Theology of Hope, pp. 304-38; Metz, The Emergent
Church, pp. 1-17.

35. Gustavo Gutierrez, "The Irruption of the Poor," in The Challenge of
Basic Christian Communities, ed. Sergio Torres and John Eagleson,
trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1981), pp. 119-20.
36. The church and sect typology is another major contribution to
theology by Ernst Troeltsch; see The Social Teaching of the Christian
Churches, 2 vols., trans. Olive Wyon (New York: Macmillan, 1931),
vol. 2.
37. Gutierrez, "Theology and Spirituality in a Latin American Context,"
p. 4.
38. The first theological base for the model of Christ liberating culture is
an argument about God; the second and related theological base is an
argument about the nature of faith.
39. Ogden, The Point of Christology, pp. 158-59. For another expression
of faith as justice, see Jon Sobrino, The True Church and the Poor,
trans. Matthew J. O'Connell (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1984), pp.
69-79.
15

Chopp
Chapter 8: Toward Praxis: A Method

for Liberation Theology
The method of modern theology, judges liberation theology, was part
and parcel of modernity's fault: method was reduced to a technical
operation and an oppressive procedure within the theological enterprise.
Consequently, the liberation theologians demand, theology must find a
new way of doing theology. The logically odd language of "doing
theology" suggests a paradigm shift in the nature and process of
theological method. In this paradigm shift, the rupturing claim of
theological method is twofold: liberation theology must find a way to
uncover the distortions within modern theology and a way to transform
theology in light of its new understanding of human existence and its
new interpretation of Christianity. Theological method in liberation
theology is, then, nothing else than the double demand to think in new
ways on a new subject.
This stress on a "new way" can also alert us to the fact not only that this
is a different kind of theological method, but also that it has a
preliminary status, for this method is in the first stages of formulation.
Reflection on method comes last in the theological enterprise, and the
preliminary nature of this method demonstrates the developing character
of liberation theology. With this assessment of the preliminary nature of
theological method in liberation theology, this writer reveals her
disagreement with a variety of interpreters and critics of liberation
theology who argue either for the hopeful prospects or for the essential
inadequacy of liberation theology's method. Indeed the intent of this
book is to demonstrate that liberation theology is much more than some

new variation of methodological finesse; rather, it is a paradigm shift in
the context, the content, the experience, and the interpretation of
Christianity. Those interpreters who rush in to bare methodological
techniques either for literal imitation or for quick dismissal fail, in this
writer's judgment, to understand the nature of liberation theology as a
paradigm shift. Indeed, rather than reading theological method in
liberation theology as either a well-established, easily imitated operation
or a nonsubstantive, popular-activist fad, it seems preferable to locate
the initial steps of liberation theology's method within the broader
attempts among a variety of disciplines for practical reflection. The
status of "newness" in liberation theology's method shares much in
common with the status of current trends in a variety of disciplines
seeking to understand their own foundations in praxis and concentrating
attention on practical reason, reason as itself shaped by social practices.
The turn to praxis in liberation theology can be examined through six
theses in order to distinguish and relate the various aspects of
theological method. The first through the third theses discuss the
sources of theology, in particular the ways of investigating human
existence and Christian witness. The underlying turn to praxis, the use
of practical reason, and the role of practical hermeneutics constitute the
fourth thesis. The final two theses treat the defining nature and tasks of
liberation theology: the fifth thesis considers the role of ideology
critique, and the sixth thesis calls into question liberation theology's
formulation of ideology critique and suggests the need for a social
theory in the method of liberation theology.
THESIS 1: THE TWO SOURCES FOR LIBERATION
THEOLOGY ARE HUMAN EXISTENCE AND CHRISTIAN
TRADITION
The two sources of theology are human existence and Christian
tradition: from these sources theology draws material, criticizes
positions, and anticipates new ways of being and doing in the world.1
Though the sources of theology remain the same, theological paradigms
differ in how sources are understood, how issues are ordered, and what
categories are used for interpretation. But in all theological paradigms,
there is the attempt to become a faithful interpretation of Christian
tradition as well as a credible representation of human existence.
Theology must be, at least in principle, accessible to human
understanding and appropriate to the tradition of which it seeks to be a
representation.2
Liberation theology utilizes a variety of disciplines and theories to
investigate the full political nature and intersubjective character of
human experience. In light of anticipatory freedom, human existence is
examined through the present reality of existence, the causal relations of
past and present, and the future possibilities for change. Liberation
theology interprets Christian tradition with the explicit theological intent
of, as Miguez Bonino says, being obedient to God's action in history.3
Liberation theology employs a variety of methods in its project of
deideologization in the interpretation of biblical texts.
Whether explicitly recognized or not, theology always has an active
relationship to what it examines, interpreting existence and tradition in
its own practical activity. Theology's subject matter of human activity is
extremely flexible, adopting and adapting insights from the various
forms of reflection upon it. Liberation theology investigates human
existence and Christian witness in light of the categories and concerns
that it receives from its own participation in existence and tradition and,
likewise, it contributes new terms, symbols, and perspectives to current
existence and Christian praxis. Thus theology is itself a practical activity
with a constant interplay between interpreting the interpretations of
culture and providing new interpretations of human activity. This might
be called the double hermeneutic of theology, and in liberation theology
this entails the explicit purpose of seeking both to interpret the language
of God by the victims of history and to be one voice of history's
victims.4
THESIS 2: LIBERATION THEOLOGY INTERPRETS THE
SOURCE OF HUMAN EXISTENCE POLITICALLY, USING,
AMONG OTHER DISCIPLINES, THE SOCIAL SCIENCES TO
REFLECT ON THE FULL CONCRETENESS OF HISTORICAL
EXISTENCE
Liberation theology interprets human existence politically through the
categories of its anthropology of praxis. The demand that the source of
human existence be investigated politically, that is, in its historical
concreteness, has two specific implications for liberation theology: (1)
there must be a real dialogue with other methods of interpretation and
transformation, and (2) theologians must be constantly self-critical,
aware of their own particular location and involvement with the material
being interpreted.
As we have already seen in the previous chapter, to investigate human

existence in its full political character, theology must engage in dialogue
with other models of interpretation and transformation as Miguez
Bonino has remarked, "incorporating socio-political instruments and
categories in our theological reflection, realizing that the political sphere
is the realm of structures, ideologies, and power."5 The argument for
dialogue with other disciplines can be summarily stated: if theology is
going to attend to concrete situations, then it must use theories that can
analyze the various factors involved in the situation.6 Due to
anticipatory freedom of human existence and the future-oriented
temporality of Christianity, any and all theological interpretation must
include an analysis of present reality and the projection of future
possibilities through models of transformation and concrete theories of
change. Liberation theology, in its attempt to avoid both abstractness
and reductionism, must also use political ethics to formulate moral and
social norms in conjunction with theological interpretations. As James
Gustafson has persuasively argued, political-ethical concepts offer the
precision and clarification for the relation between social reality and
theological symbols -- a precision and clarification that liberation
theology demands, both through its own reading of the tradition and
through its turn to praxis.7 Thus if theology wishes to be a critical
reflection within a community wanting to lobby for the release of
political prisoners, it will have to analyze the political systems, the
prison systems, and the use of public pressure in that society. It may
have to use educational methods to train people in their rights and
organizational methods to mobilize persons for action. Specific ethical
arguments will have to be advanced for the rights of dissent, free
speech, and so forth. Whether they are utilizing socio-scientific
explanations, ethical reflections on moral positions, or models of
transformation and strategies for change, liberation theologians must
always be able to give arguments as to the relative adequacy of the
particular model, strategy, or interpretation.
As theologians dialogue with various theories of interpretation and
models of transformation, the political source of human existence
requires a reflective awareness and critique of the theologian's own
values and commitments. Indeed, the double hermeneutic of theology
implies that there is no value-free interpretation and, therefore, that the
line between the categories used in interpretation and the subject matter
of interpretation is always situated and flexible. Liberation theologians
are called to be suspicious of motives for interpretation; in the
preference for one theory over another there is always the danger of
simply inserting one 's own values and commitments into theology. Yet
theologians are not reduced to merely reflecting any particular interests
and values operative in a particular situation; rather, constant awareness,
dialogue within the community, and the ongoing analysis of arguments
used within theological interpretation all contribute to the ability of
theologians to position themselves.8 To be able to interpret at all is the
possibility that one is not enslaved or reduced to literal reproduction,
that the theologian can see alternatives, perspectives, and possibilities
for change. Liberation theology emphasizes participation and
involvement in human existence, but only through a constant mode of
self-critical awareness.
THESIS 3: THEOLOGY EMPLOYS A HERMENEUTICS OF
LIBERATION, INCLUDING A PROJECT OF
DEIDEOLOGIZATION IN RELATION TO THE SOURCE OF
CHRISTIAN TRADITION
The second major source for liberation theology is the Christian
tradition, including the Bible, ecclesiological statements, and former
theological interpretations. As the founding document of the living
tradition, the Bible has a privileged place as the originary witness of
Christian faith. Many liberation theologians intentionally give a
prominent place to the Bible in their theologies, encouraging a freedom
of understanding and interpreting that makes this theology a new
"biblical" theology. Liberation theologians call for a hermeneutical
circulation among the text, former interpretations, and the interpreter -a circulation within which the Bible is both disclosive and
transformative of Christian praxis. As part of the hermeneutical
circulation, theology studies the text as a document arising out of a
particular time and place. But arguments about the historical facts or
situation do not suffice for a theological interpretation; indeed historicalcritical arguments and other theoretical arguments about the nature of
the text only aid in formulating a theological understanding of the text.
With these arguments in hand, the theologian must make an
interpretation of the text for this time and place.
Within its hermeneutical circulation, liberation theology engages in a
project of deideologization in a twofold sense: positively, by letting the
text speak through the particularity of the time and, critically, through
specific attention to false ideologies within text and tradition. As a
reformulation of Rudolf Bultmann's project of demythologization, the
first act of deideologization interprets the text in and through its

concrete sociopolitical context.9 Bultmann demanded that the historical
particularities of the text be interpreted so that the universal event could
be revealed; the myth, in other words, demands its own interpretation. In
liberation theology, deideologization takes a sociological turn, requiring
that the sociopolitical particularities of the text be examined. Miguez
Bonino provides one example of deideologization, arguing that only by
analyzing the particular historical context of a biblical account can the
interpreter appropriately discern God's action in history.10
In the interpretation of Scripture, the theologian must pay special
attention to the sociopolitical contexts and the history of effects of the
text. Liberation theology continues to use historical methods of research
to locate and explain the text in its historical context. Increasingly
popular are sociohistorical methods to analyze the broader context of
Scripture and its effects, with special attention to patterns of human
relations. Norman Gottwald explains the use of both historical and
sociological criticism in relation to the study of ancient Israel: Historical
method embraces all the methods of inquiry drawn from the humanities
(e.g., literary criticism, form criticism, tradition criticism, rhetorical
criticism, redaction criticism, history, history of religion, biblical
theology). Sociological method includes all the methods of inquiry
proper to the social sciences (e.g., anthropology, sociology, political
science, economics). Sociological method in data collection and theory
building enables us to analyze, synthesize, abstract, and interpret
Israelite life and thought along different axes and with different tools
and constructs from those familiar to us from historical method.
Sociological inquiry recognizes people as social actors and symbolizers
who "perform" according to interconnecting regularities and within
boundaries of limits (social systems).11
Deideologization requires an explanation of the sociohistorical context
of the text so that the theologian may attempt to understand the possible
relevance of the text for the present day and age.
Thus far, literary modes of interpretation have not been used frequently
by liberation theologians. But the role of the Bible in liberation theology
as neither rule book nor literal guide demands attention to the use and
reception of the Bible as a literary text. The Bible is the religious text of
Christians who may have little or no idea of its original historical
context -- it speaks to persons as a text through its narratives, its poetry,
its accounts, and its letters. Given the importance of narrative in
liberation theology, literary theories can join historical and sociological

methods in helping the theologian to offer an interpretation of the text.12
Literary theories, historical methods, and sociohistorical approaches are
methods to explain the text; the theologian must use these aids to render
an appropriate interpretation for today. The theologian cannot confuse
the explanation of the historical situation of a text or the examination of
the structure of a text with theological interpretation; the project of
deideologization uses explanations of the text to contribute to a new
theological interpretation of the text in the current context of Christian
praxis.
Deideologization also includes specific attention to the ideological
distortions within the text and the ideological use of the text throughout
the tradition. Given the fact that the Bible is a historical document,
providing the vision of Christian praxis through narratives, letters, and
historical accounts of particular persons in particular situations,
distortions can appear within the text. The truth of the Bible exists in the
ways of being portrayed and provoked by the text, not in the literal facts
or activities reported in the text. The project of deideologization forces
the recognition of distortions within the classical Christian text and
through the history of interpretation of the text.13 Indeed, some of the
dangerous memories of suffering in liberation theology may well be
those of the victims of the distortions in the Scriptures. For example,
some New Testament texts picture the Jew as the other, the enemy, and
the killer of Christ. Such texts may not have the possibility of retrieval;
such instances of deideologization may force theology into a position of
confession as well as conversion within its own tradition.
Deideologization in this sense, is the critical demand that the classical
texts, while privileged, are not secured or finalized in their systemic
distortions.
THESIS 4: THE METHOD OF LIBERATION THEOLOGY CAN

BE CHARACTERIZED AS A CRITICAL PRAXIS
CORRELATION, WHEREIN PRAXIS IS BOTH THE
FOUNDATION AND THE AIM OF THEOLOGICAL
HERMENEUTICS14
Insisting that all life, and life as a whole, is grounded in praxis,
liberation theologians seek a critical relationship between praxis and
theory in theology.15 This relationship of theory and praxis is oriented
not to the mere understanding of the present, but to the active
transformation of past and present into the future. Langdon Gilkey's

definition of praxis indicates the orientation of this theological method:
(1) the polarity of theory with action (the purpose of thinking is to
change reality not merely to comprehend it) and of action with theory
(no responsible and reflective action is possible without social
understanding of the structure, trends, and possibilities in social
actuality), (2) the polarity of actuality and possibility: present actualities
are not to be negated by future-oriented theory and practice, a negation
by unified theory and practice of the negativities of actual theory and
practice so that new possibilities may appear.16
Praxis, as the ground and aim of theology, calls for an epistemological
shift within theological reflection. This epistemological shift, denying
the primacy of universal or abstract theory, assumes that the practical
conditions of life -- the historical nature of existence -- are the
conditions for all theory and reflection. Richard Bernstein's description
of Marx's epistemological insight captures this turn to praxis: "one that
shows us that man's practical relation to the objects and the world he
confronts is the basis for understanding man's cognitive relationship to
the world."17
This epistemological shift to recognize praxis as the foundation and aim
of theory is occurring not only in liberation theology but also within a
variety of other fields. Most startling among the various instances of
"the turn to praxis" has been the discussion of the hermeneutical
dimension of scientific praxis, but such conversations occur across the
fields of science, sociology, history, political science, literary criticism,
and psychology. The various discussions share in common the
realization of the practical foundation of human knowledge, and the
recognition that theories and paradigms change and develop historically.
The turn to praxis necessitates, among other things, a quest for a new
form of practical reason.
Practical reason, having to do with concrete decisions of life, suggests
the mediation of theory and praxis in sociopolitical life. It appeals not
only to theoretical knowledge and unconscious knowledge, but also to
practical knowledge -- the knowledge of daily activity. Fred Dallmayr
defines practical knowledge as "insights grounded through life
experience and through public conduct, preferably in public affairs."18
Practical knowledge must use theoretical arguments and technical
applications, but both are moments within the broader activity of
understanding the full range of life in the polis and of producing and
reproducing human activity. In liberation theology practical reason
includes the knowledge of daily activity, the analysis and interpretation
of praxis, the reflexive relation of criticism to theory, and the projection
of possibilities for concrete change. Practical reason is embodied,
involved, and participative; it is reason within the polis that is oriented
to the making and changing of history.
Within the turn to praxis as the foundation and aim of theology,
liberation theology is marked by at least three new characteristics. First,
theology is known as a practical activity, characterized by its
concreteness in dealing with particular events, stories, and witnesses
rather than limiting its role to the analysis of general concepts of
existence and tradition. Theology is "practical," as it is a critical and
transformative reflection on the actual activity of a Christian community
and on the particular situation of its own cultural and social context. The
practical nature of theology depends upon the use of practical reason
and the nature of Christian faith as a particular praxis: thus, reflection on
the need for a new educational system or the looming apocalypse of
nuclear war is not the application of theology but part of the constitutive
activity of theology. Matthew Lamb, first to identify the method of
critical praxis correlation, summarizes the practical nature of this
method:
Common to theologians of this type is a realization that the practical and
theoretical issues facing academics, churches, and societies can only be
met in an ongoing critical collaboration mediating the cries of the
victims to those interested in transforming the structures of world and
church. Both the reflex character of the relationship between theory and
praxis and its question of norms involve a concomitant change
(conversion) of social structures and consciousness. Such conversions -as ongoing withdrawals from bias and sin -- are intrinsic to both genuine
religious traditions of faith and to the realization of reason in human
histories and societies.19
The practical nature of this method includes the three particular tasks of
liberation theology as identified by Gutierrez: the theory of a definite
situation; the critique of church and society in light of the Word of God;
and the projection of future possibilities in the church and in the polis.
Theology is itself now a practical political activity.
Second, theology uses narrative as a basic form or structure of theology
to retrieve the Christian tradition, to narrate the dangerous memories of

suffering, and to effect conversion and transformation. In liberation
theology the centrality of narrative is the attention to the radically
historical and hermeneutical character of life and to the narrative
structure of Christianity. Narrative speaks of suffering in a way that
theory cannot; it matches the structure of human experience and the
nature of Christian tradition. In the very telling and retelling of the
stories and memories of the tradition, narrative performs; that is, it
converts, informs, and changes us. Narrative demonstrates not only the
new form of theology, but also the new practical activity of theology
that speaks to both human existence and Christian praxis.20
Third, theology has a communal form as a part of Christianity's
continual activity in the world. Liberation theologians insist on the
importance of the theologian's own participation within a Christian
community.21 As it guides, interprets, and criticizes Christian praxis,
theology is in a relationship of solidarity with those who suffer. It is a
form of solidarity with the Christian tradition as it seeks to understand
and interpret the Christian message in the present day. Theology has a
communal form not only in its locus, tasks, and intents, but also in its
content and interpretations. The communal character requires the
contextualization of theology -- putting theology in the language,
symbols, and rituals of Christian experience in the pluralism of concrete
communities that comprise contemporary Christianity.
Within the community, with the narratives and the concrete tasks of
interpretation, liberation theology's method of praxis correlation consists
of a practical hermeneutics. The ongoing interpretation of the tradition
and the situation is, in liberation theology, itself an act of faith.
Theological interpretation is not something we do and then apply but,
rather, something that we are and by which we are continually
transformed. The assumptions of liberation theology's practical
hermeneutics are similar to those underlying the work of philosopher
Hans-Georg Gadamer; for both, hermeneutics names the very nature of
our being -- interpreting texts and context is the activity of being human
in the world.22 In liberation theology, as with Gadamer, we are
constantly in conversation: continually deciding, choosing, judging, and
determining who we are and who we shall be -- not as a private or an
individual act, but as a public and communal activity. The paradigm
shift of liberation theology is toward a method of critical praxis
correlation that depends on the ongoing activity of understanding and
transformation, of interpretation and appropriation, only and always in
terms of historical events and situations.
THESIS 5: LIBERATION THEOLOGY'S METHOD OF

CRITICAL PRAXIS CORRELATION IS, BY ITS NATURE, A
FORM OF IDEOLOGY CRITIQUE
As a paradigm shift, liberation theology stands as a radical critique of
the systematic distortions in modernity. Political theology criticizes
modernity for its insidious destruction of human subjectivity by
evolutionary logic. Latin American liberation theology began as a
critique of the economic policies of development in third-world
countries, and broadened to become a critique of the center and the
margins, the rich and the poor, within the making and interpreting of
history. Ideology critique marks the origins, the tasks, and the nature of
liberation theology.
A curious stepchild of modernity, ideology critique considers various
relations of interest, power, and belief through systematic distortions or
false ideologies within the normative and legitimizing sanctions or
beliefs of society. Ideology critique appeals in particular to situations of
oppression, such as the poor in Latin America, or, within the first world,
to distortions of historical consciousness. Theoretically formulated
through various critical theories, ideology critique performs its social
therapy by uncovering or revealing the distortions and moving the agent
to a new future. Praxis, for ideology critique, is defined by the pursuit of
freedom through the concerns of interest, knowledge, and power.
The grounds and telos of a critical theology are the solidarity of human
praxis expressed either through a transcendental argument appealing to
some universal norm or through a contextual argument appealing to
particular social practices.23 Liberation theology generally uses
contextual arguments, appealing to properties within particular
situations, such as the promise of freedom in the Enlightenment or the
theme of humanization in Catholic social teaching. In its contextual
appeal, liberation theology offers theological justification both for its
specific ideology critiques and for its own nature as a critical theory.
The relationship of ideology critique and liberation theology can be
distinguished by the use of three levels: (1) ideology critique and
Christian symbols, (2) Christian praxis as a critical activity, and (3)
liberation theology as a critical theory.
1. Ideology critique and Christian symbols: Within liberation theology,

theological symbols are used to break through the distortions of the
present and to anticipate a new future. The cross as a symbol of
suffering is interpreted by way of the resurrection as the representation
of hope and righteousness; in this symbolic identification, hope and
righteousness belong to those who suffer. To take another example,
redemption is a symbol that functions as the ideology critique of all
ideology critique, for redemption reveals that there can be no complete
realization of human freedom in history and that theories promising
freedom are forever tempted to become one more form of enslavement.
In liberation theology, a variety of religious symbols, narratives, and
dogmas perform the function of ideology critique, ranging from the
rituals and saints of popular religion to the retrieval of classical
theological interpretations.
2. Christian praxis as a critical activity: On the second level, liberation
theologians claim that Christianity is itself a critical activity, an activity
forming and transforming human freedom. Miguez Bonino, for instance,
in his dialogue with Marxism retrieves the radically monotheistic God
and the injunction against idolatry to demonstrate the iconoclastic nature
of faith. Christianity is far more critical than Marxism, Miguez Bonino
argues, for the nature of Christian activity is the opposition of any and
all idolatry; the proclamation of Christianity is inherently against
oppression and injustice: "the Bible does not merely support the
contention that religion becomes an excuse for injustice. It announces
God's active purpose to overturn and destroy such idolatrous
manipulation of his gifts. As a matter of fact, one of the permanent
motifs in the biblical story is God's judgment against the perverse and
inhuman distortions of the signs of God's humanizing mercy and
righteousness."24 Christian praxis is, for liberation theology, an activity
of human freedom representing the identity of the subject in history.
Religious experience is located in anticipatory freedom as the making,
the doing, and the reproducing of history. As theology employs specific
symbols for ideology critique, so theology reflects on Christian praxis
that is engaged in the struggle for freedom, that is both enlightenment
and emancipation, mediated in relation to redemption.
3. Liberation theology as a critical theory: On the third and final level,
theology is itself a form of critical theory; on this level the paradigm
shift of liberation theology includes the nature as well as the purpose of
its method. Theology does not just incidentally bring about freedom
because it reflects on certain symbols or doctrines in certain ways;
theology does not necessarily result in freedom because it offers

theoretical arguments as to the nature of freedom. As a form of social
and religious therapy, theology anticipates freedom, calling into
question the way things are, seeking out distortions, provoking a new
way of being and doing in history. As part of its practical nature,
theology is inherently involved with emancipation and enlightenment,
and its form must be critical: uncovering, revealing, healing, and
enlightening.
Consequently, ideology critique is not just a function of liberation
theology, but is also part of the nature of liberation theology; somewhat
rephrased, liberation theology does not just use some critical theory -- it
becomes a critical theory.25 Liberation theology claims to be a theory of
freedom, to uncover distortions of consciousnesss and systems of
oppression and to anticipate new ways of being human. Raymond
Geuss's definition of a critical theory could be descriptive of liberation
theology: "a critical theory, then, is a reflective theory which gives
agents a kind of knowledge inherently productive of enlightenment and
emancipation."26 Liberation theology attempts to correct or to clarify the
knowledge of persons about their own interests and needs. As a critical
theory, liberation theology also attempts to bring about emancipation,
criticizing oppressive and destructive systems and freeing persons from
coercive situations.27
As a critical theory, liberation theology is a persuasive demonstration of
freedom through the critical interpretation of past, present, and future.
Liberation theology's critical theory has, thus far, been a rhetoric of
oppositions and contradictions -- the poor vs. the rich; the nonperson vs.
the person; messianic Christianity vs. bourgeois religion. Using
aphorisms, stories, and examples, it interrupts, converts, and anticipates
within the very act of "doing" theology, as seen in Gutierrez's rhetoric:
"wanted: a therapy for historical amnesia," or in Metz's: "the shortest
definition of religion: interruption."28 Both notions criticize the form
and content of previous interpretations and anticipate new ways of
interpreting and new interpretations. Liberation theology as a critical
theory arises out of Christian praxis, its contents determined by the
relations of context and text, and its future open to the possibilities of
history.
THESIS 6: LIBERATION THEOLOGY MUST DEVELOP AN

ADEQUATE SOCIAL THEORY TO ATTEND TO THE FULL
MEANING OF PRAXIS
Thus far we have interpreted the method of liberation theology through
its turn to praxis as including both a practical hermeneutics and a critical
theory. With this final thesis we shall argue that liberation theology
must now develop a social theory, that is, a new way of conceiving
human praxis that considers an anthropology of human agency and
social structures. In this social theory, neither the subject nor the society
can be privileged, but must be brought together in order to understand
the production and reproduction of social practices. The problem can be
stated in the following question: Is ideology critique and practical
hermeneutics, as developed, adequate to the full demands of the turn to
praxis? Conversely, does praxis not demand an adequate social theory
internal to the nature of theology? We can explore the problem by
looking at the function of the term "praxis" in two theologians, Gustavo
Gutierrez and Johann Baptist Metz.29
For Gutierrez, praxis is first used as a reading of modern history to
distinguish between historical praxis and liberating praxis. Historical
praxis, for Gutierrez, is characterized by humanity's manipulation of
historical and natural forces. The success of modernity has depended
upon the massive contradictions between the poor nonperson and the
rich person. Liberating praxis is that activity in recent Latin American
history that struggles against the distortions of oppression and
repression that characterize historical praxis.
Gutierrez believes that a new stage of history is appearing, a stage due
to the inevitable reality of class conflict.30 The difference between
historical praxis and liberating praxis is twofold: (1) the agent of
liberating praxis is the poor nonperson who is in conflict with the rich
person, and (2) the new stage of history comes about through the
realization of the consciousness of the oppressed and through the
movement of liberating praxis. Both characteristics place Gutierrez's use
of the term "praxis" within the broad tradition of humanism, and, more
particularly, within Marxist appeals to the primacy of class conflict.
Gutierrez does not claim, in his interpretation of liberating praxis, that
social structures are changing or that they have the potential for change
but, rather, that the poor are breaking into history -- the poor are freeing
themselves from oppressive ideologies and are anticipating new ways of
being human. But it is difficult to determine precisely what (rather than
who) is meant by class conflict. Though Gutierrez is influenced by
dependency theory, his notion of class conflict is far more than a
sociological or economic analysis. Rather, the notion of class conflict

appears as a total division -- economic, political, cultural, even
historical. Class conflict becomes a key to the philosophy of history or,
in Gutierrez's language, a rereading and remaking of history. As it
becomes a philosophy of history, it ceases to be connected, in
Gutierrez's works, with structural analysis. As a call for
conscientization, class conflict demands that the poor educate
themselves to change the present situation. As the symbol of the old
stage of history giving rise to the new, the new is inevitable whether or
not the poor realize a higher level of consciousness. But, whichever
meaning may be preferred, neither suggests an analysis of the relation of
human agency and social structures nor indicates a model of
transformation for the new stage of liberating praxis. As an ideology
critique, class conflict functions as a call for conscientization and as a
description of history; it does not entail the investigation or
transformation of the polis.
Parallel to the problem of analyzing class conflict runs the connection of
class conflict and the state in Gutierrez's work. For Gutierrez, class
conflict is never tied to a particular analysis of the role and the nature of
the state.31 While there is a powerful argument as to the universality of
the poor, it seems impossible to offer a real critique and strategy without
the analysis of major institutional structures, especially those of the
state. In contemporary history the state has taken on powers of
nationalism and militarism that may not be connected directly to
particular class divisions. Both of these problems can be located
between Gutierrez's use of ideology critique and the demands of praxis
in his theology. Take, for instance, Gutierrez's identification of the tasks
of theology: theology is to criticize the church and society in light of the
Word of God, to be a theory of a definite praxis, and to project future
possibilities within the present situation. Though theology can certainly
do the first task, given Gutierrez's actual use of liberating praxis vs.
historical praxis, theology cannot be a theory of praxis or anticipate new
possibilities without an adequate social theory to relate anthropology
(the conscientization of the poor) and history (the new stage of
liberating praxis) to social structures. Gutierrez has, as yet, failed to
make the essential link between human consciousness and institutional
structures within his own philosophy of history.
Metz's use of praxis is located within a rather searing critique of
modern, rationalized society characterized by an evolutionary logic that
privatizes tradition, cultural values, and religion. If Gutierrez's critique
follows a Marxist interpretation of class conflict, Metz's critique follows

a Weberian-Frankfurt School interpretation of means-end rationality and
the inevitablility of an iron-cage society. Though Gutierrez may readily
appeal to the obvious suffering of the poor, Metz must, in the steps of
the Frankfurt School, first reveal that subjects are suffering in
modernity. To counter the evolutionary logic that he believes creates the
systematic forgetfulness of human subjectivity, Metz turns to what the
logic suppresses, the activity of suffering.
For Metz, praxis functions in reference to the distortion of historical
consciousness through evolutionary logic. Metz's critical concern is the
epistemic distortion of human subjectivity in modernity. As in any good
critical theory, once the distortion is uncovered, emancipation must be
anticipated, and thus Metz calls for an anthropological revolution. The
problems of Metz's critique are located in the adequacy of his
interpretation of modernity and the possibilities for transformation of
historical consciousness and society. Against Metz's portrayal of the
iron cage of modernity one must balance the process of individual rights
in modernity. Metz can discount these as bourgeois, but to do that he
must depend on a very selective reading of the history of political,
institutional, and civil freedoms of modern Western societies. Likewise,
the separation between the private and the public is not as complete as
Metz judges: even in nations such as the United States, with the formal
separation of church and state, the public influence of religion has not
been destroyed. Both the developing process of rights and the pervasive
role of religion have, at least sometimes, functioned as an antidote to the
evolutionary logic that Metz identifies.32
Metz's critical interpretation not only denies the complexity of modern
society, but also makes the projection of new possibilities highly
problematic in theological method. Iron-cage theories tend, as did
Weber's, to deny any resources or foundation for change, for once the
subject and the social system reach the more advanced stages of
rationalization, it is extremely difficult to press claims for enlightenment
or emancipation. This problem can be illustrated by Metz's demand for a
new form of politics, which Metz hopes can be a new form of
imagination. Metz argues that this imaginative vision must be kept
separate from the planning of the state so that the concrete situation of
life will not be dissolved into technical planning and production; thus
Metz refuses to connect his transformative vision with any social
conditions for the possibility of change. Working from an ideology
critique that forgets the struggle of human rights, that ignores the
reproductive character of social systems, and that never considers a

structural analysis of institutions, Metz has no place to go but to seek
some radically alternative vision. While the impulse of religious
traditions may be to provide alternative vision, to dissociate these from
the structural conditions of life is both naive and inadequate to the
demands of praxis, especially social praxis, as the foundation and aim of
theology.
If theology is to be grounded in praxis, and praxis is distorted in the
manner so powerfully shown by Metz, theology must develop a social
theory that allows politics to be more than an alternative vision for the
few. Though historical consciousness may be distorted and in danger of
extinction, given the social anthropology of Metz's practical,
fundamental theology, human consciousness is always constitutive of
and constituted by social structures. If Metz remains true to his social
anthropology, his practical, fundamental theology must reformulate its
ideology critique and its hermeneutics through a theory of social praxis -an understanding of the interrelatedness of human agency and social
structures. Though narrative and dangerous memories may adequately
constitute hermeneutics and ideology critique as correlated to human
existence and Christianity, both human subjects and Christianity also
exist through and contribute to social systems. Human existence, for
example, may well have a narrative structure -- recalling the past in
anticipation of the future as the grounds of freedom. But human
existence, given Metz's own social anthropology, also has a social
structure -- gaining its freedom and identity through its participation in
social systems. Praxis for Metz, as for Gutierrez, promises more than it
delivers, demands more than it offers.
The diagnosis is simple: praxis, in liberation theology, has been
formulated through ideology critiques that displace the interrelations
between human agency and social structures. In its use of ideology
critique, liberation theology attends to the consciousness of the "social"
subject within a philosophy of history that ignores the related structures
of situated societies. To ignore these interrelations dictates that the
critique will be inadequate and impotent, and that models of
transformation will have to be content to envision new forms of
consciousness and not new forms of sociopolitical existence. This is not
to deny the importance and the necessity of Gutierrez's and Metz's
critiques, but simply to suggest that given their own demands of praxis,
a social theory must be developed within the theological method of
liberation theology. Having located both anthropology and Christianity
in the praxis of the polis, liberation theology must now include a social
theory adequate to the demands of sociopolitical existence. There are
three equally valid arguments for this claim: first, if existence is
political, intersubjective, and future-oriented, we must interpret human
existence in terms of the interrelations of human agency and social
structure. Second, if Christian theology mediates liberation and
salvation, it must work with the theories and activities of human agents
and social structures. Third, ideology critique demands its own
transformation, for its therapeutic nature requires actual change as well
as new understanding, and only an adequate social theory can allow the
projection of possibilities for change in both human agency and social
structures.
An adequate social theory for liberation theology might well follow
Marx's dictum that "man" makes history, but not in circumstances of his
own choosing, for any critical interpretation of praxis must today bring
together human action and structural explanation. Praxis means that
human action is always a situated practice, both temporal and social,
characterized not only by knowledge -- discursive, practical, and
unconscious -- but also by capability, the ability to determine that which
could be otherwise.33 Anthony Giddens's model of structuration
provides one possibility of such a social theory.34 For Giddens, agents
exist through practices, structures exist through rules and principles, but
rules and practices always exist in conjunction with each other through
systems. Any reflection on praxis, in this social theory, must take
account of the interdependence of human agency and social systems
through what Giddens calls the duality of structure, the social nature of
praxis as always both medium and outcome of the practices that
constitute the system: "the structural properties of social systems do not
exist outside of action but are chronically implicated in its production
and reproduction."35 Stressing the recursive nature of any theory of
praxis, Giddens's social theory emphasizes both change and duration in
praxis and considers the time-space relation inherent in all social
interactions. Such a theory may well offer the possibility of analyzing
praxis more adequately, of formulating possibilities of change within the
duration of social systems, and thus in turn the "doing of theology" in a
new way Whether or not liberation theology utilizes Giddens's model of
structuration or some other model of social theory, the necessity
remains: the turn to praxis demands a reformulation of practical
hermeneutics and ideology critique through an adequate social theory
within the nature and method of theological reflection.
NOTES:
1. For the explication of the two sources for theology, see Schubert
Ogden, "What Is Theology," Journal of Religion 52(1972):22-40; and
David Tracy, "A Revisionist Model for Contemporary Theology," in his
Blessed Rage for Order (New York: Seabury Press, 1979), pp. 43-63.
2. Tracy, Blessed Rage for Order pp. 64-78; and Ogden, "What Is
Theology," pp. 25-27.
4. Anthony Giddens, The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory
of Structuration (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1984), p. xxxv. Though Giddens is concerned with the double
hermeneutic of the social sciences, given the nature of theology to
reflect on human experience, the same must be said of theology.
Theology and the social sciences both reflect on frames of reference,
and their findings are, or at least can potentially be, incorporated back
into the frame of reference.
5. Jose Miguez Bonino, "Historical Praxis and Christian Identity," in
6. See Johann Baptist Metz and Trutz Rendtorff, eds., Die Theologie in
der interd isziplinaren Forschung (Dusseldorf: Bertelsmann
Universitatsverlag, 1971).
7. James Gustafson, Ethics from a Theocentric Perspective, Vol. I
(Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press, 1981), p. 73.
8. Jose Miguez Bonino, Toward a Christian Political Ethics,
9. Schubert Ogden, The Point of Christology (New York: Harper &
Row, 1982), pp. 94-96, 164-65; and "The Concept of a Theology of
Liberation," in The Challenge of Liberation Theology, ed. Brian Mahan
and L. Dale Richesin (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1981), pp. 13031, 136-39. See also Alfred T. Hennelly, Theologies in Conflict: The
Challenge of Juan Luis Segundo (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1979),
pp. 177-78.
11. Norman Gottwald, "Sociological Method in the Study of Ancient
Israel," in The Bible and Liberation: Political and Social Hermeneutics,
ed. Norman Gottwald (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1983), p. 27.
12. These various theories all aid in understanding. A historical
reconstruction of Jesus or a literary construal of the sense of the text
does not complete a theological interpretation of the text for the present
situation.
13. An excellent feminist deideologization of Scripture is presented by
Elizabeth Schussler Fiorenza, In Memory of Her: A Feminist
Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins (New York: Crossroad
Publishing Co., 1983), and "Towards a Feminist Biblical Hermeneutics:
Biblical Interpretation and Liberation Theology," in The Challenge of
Liberation Theology, ed. Brian Mahan and L. Dale Richesin, pp. 91112.
14. For the notion of a "critical praxis correlation," I am indebted to
Matthew Lamb, Solidarity with Victims (New York: Crossroad
Publishing Co., 1982), pp. 82-87.
15. For a treatment of the relation between theory and praxis, see
Richard J. Bernstein, Praxis and Action: Contemporary Philosophies of
Human Activity (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971);
Nicholas Lobkowicz, Theory and Practice: History of a Concept from
Aristotle to Marx (South Bend, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press,
1967). For a succinct statement of the terms "theoria" and "praxis" in
Aristotle, see Thomas McCarthy, The Critical Theory of Jurgen
Habermas (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1981), pp. 1-4.
16. Langdon Gilkey, Reaping the Whirlwind: A Christian Interpretation
of History (New York: Seabury, 1976), p. 369.
17. Bernstein, Praxis and Action, p.73. See also Leszek Kolakowski,
"Karl Marx and the Classical Definition of Truth," in his Toward a

Marxist Humanism, trans. Jane Zielonko Peel (New York: Grove Press,
1968), p. 46.
18. Fred Dallmayr, Polls and Praxis (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press,
1984), p. 167.
19. Lamb, Solidarity with Victims, p. 87.
20. The recognition of narrative as central to the theological enterprise is
not unique among liberation theologians. It occurs in theologians as
diverse as David Tracy, The Analogical Imagination (New York:
Crossroad Publishing Co., 1981), and Stanley Hauerwas, The Peaceable
Kingdom (Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 1983).
R. Barr (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1983), p. 212.
22. Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. 0. Borden and J.
Cumming (New York: Seabury Press, 1975), pp. 235-341.
23. Raymond Geuss, The Idea of a Critical Theory (Cambridge,
England: Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 63-68.
24. Jose Miguez Bonino, Christians and Marxists (Grand Rapids,
Mich.: Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1976), p. 65.
25. I am proposing that critical theory and practical hermeneutics must
be related but distinguished in theology. I am influenced in this
judgment by Paul Ricoeur, "Hermeneutics and the Critique of
Ideology," in Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences: Essays on
Language, Action, and Interpretation, ed. and trans. John B. Thompson
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 63-100.
26. Raymond Geuss, The Idea of a Critical Theory, p. 2.
27. Ibid.
28. Gutierrez, Power of the Poor, p. 77; Johann Baptist Metz, Faith in
History and Society, trans. David Smith (New York: Seabury Press,
1980), p. 171.
29. I have chosen Gutierrez and Metz, since they have, in this text,
provided the basic arguments for the paradigm shift and the constructive
interpretations of the "praxis" of Christianity. Miguez Bonino's theology
includes a hermeneutics of context and should be, at least on internal
grounds, agreeable to my argument for the need of a social theory. The
problem with Miguez Bonino is his refusal to give equal weight to
ideology critique, preferring to see it as one moment within the
hermeneutics of the world. Moltmann, at least in my interpretation,
methodologically denies any relevance to incorporating a social theory
in theological method; the unique foundation of Moltmann's theology is
to serve as its own social theory.
30. Gutierrez thinks this new stage of history presents a kairos, a
decisive time for the encounter of God in history (We Drink from Our
Own Wells, trans. Matthew J. O'Connell [Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis
Books; Melbourne: Dove Communications, 1984], p. 136).
31. There is some difference between liberation theologians who rely on
the social analysis of dependency theory and those who rely on the
analysis of a national security system. Gutierrez represents the former,
Jose Comblin the latter. See Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, ed.
and trans. Sister Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll, N.Y.:
Orbis Books, 1973); Jose Comblin, The Church and the National
Security State (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1979).
32. Ignoring events such as the civil rights movement and the current
peace movement, Metz portrays the human subject as almost completely
determined by the sociopolitical realm through the rationalization of
consciousness. Metz succumbs to a common temptation of critical
theory -- the reduction of the individual. A related criticism can be
directed to Metz's insistence, shared with Frankfurt School critical
theorists such as Adorno, on the negativity of critical thought. What
Buck-Morss said about Adorno could also be said of Metz, that by
abandoning any use-value of reason (as a way of abolishing
instrumental reason), Adorno abrogated any political utility for critical
theory: "Hence in the name of revolution, thought could never
acknowledge a revolutionary situation; in the name of utopia, it could
never work for utopia's realization" (Susan Buck-Morss, The Origin of
Negative Dialectics New York: Free Press, 1977], p. 189).
33. Anthony Giddens, Central Problems in Social Theory: Action,
Structure and Contradiction in Social Analysis (Berkeley and Los

Angeles: University of California Press, 1983), p. 56. As Giddens notes,
this notion of "could have done otherwise" must be understood in the
context of historically located modes of activity.
34. Ibid., pp. 49-95, and The Constitution of Society: Outline of the
Theory of Structuration (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1984). Giddens attempts to combine structuralism, dialectical
materialism, and philosophical hermeneutics to formulate a social
theory of human praxis. In this he is critical of much of the functionalist
bias of much modern social theory, the view that society has needs that
it inevitably must satisfy apart from human intentionality and practical
knowledge. Giddens offers one way of formulating a "social"
anthropology, which, though it decenters the human subject, does not
"deconstruct" the subject's participation in the reproduction of history.
35. Giddens, The Constitution of Society, p. 374.
32

Chopp
Chapter 9: Conclusion
In conclusion, we might question the central thesis of this book -- that
liberation theology is a new paradigm -- by asking if liberation theology
is really so different from modern theology. Certainly, liberation
theology is, in part, constituted as a radical critique of modern theology;
it accuses modern theology of privileging the bourgeois subject, of
utilizing reifying methods of reflection, of misinterpreting Christian
tradition, and of legitimizing modernity's barbarism. As a counter to
these systematic distortions, liberation theology claims to be a new way
of understanding human existence, of interpreting Christian witness,
and of formulating theological reflection. But the point of our question
is neither simply to repeat the critiques nor merely to underline the
claims of liberation theology, but to ask if between those critiques and
claims, there lies a substantial departure from modern theology.
One answer has to be no, for liberation theology continues -- albeit in a
radically reformulated manner -- the fundamental nature of modern
theology. We can defend this answer by identifying the basic
assumptions of modern theology and by demonstrating liberation
theology's continuity with these assumptions. For this purpose we have
to limit ourselves to six assumptions, the first three of which govern
modern theology's assent to modernity, the last three of which dictate
the understanding of modern religious experience: (1) the human
subject is a meaning-seeker; (2) the human subject must be brought to
higher consciousness; (3) history and nature are both characterized by
the interrelation of cause and effect; (4) faith is located in personal
experience and neither contradicts nor is reducible to scientific or
historical knowledge; (5) tradition itself demands continual

reinterpretation and change; (6) theology has an interpretive role,
mediating the relationship of human existence and Christian tradition.
Within modern theology, liberal and neo-orthodox theology gave rise to
quite different expressions of these common assumptions. For instance,
in liberalism the human subject found meaning in the progress of
history; in neo-orthodoxy the human subject sought meaning outside of
history. To take another example, liberal theology anticipated higher
consciousness through intellectual and moral knowledge; neoorthodoxy explored higher consciousness in personal, existential
reflection.
It certainly can be argued that these assumptions continue in liberation
theology. Liberation theology believes as fervently as liberal theology
that humanity must find meaning in history, but, like neo-orthodoxy,
liberation theology also finds history deeply troubled. Liberation
theology continues modern anthropology's project of higher
consciousness, but intends this new consciousness to uncover coercion
and distortion, to be aimed at political freedom and historical selfdetermination, and to be arrived at through conscientization in basic
Christian communities, by the participation in some form of social
therapy, or through the use of some form of critical theory. In this way,
the human subject can affect the causal relations of history and nature
understood now in a radically social sense as rational, historically
determined, and open to change.
Within the assumptions governing the understanding of modern
religious experience, the continuity through reformulation of liberation
theology with modern theology also continues. Liberation theology
locates faith in "personal" experience, but the personal is now properly
within the community and experience is reinterpreted as activity.
Theology relies upon "modern" knowledge, especially the social
sciences, to aid in guidance of praxis, although theological reflection
cannot be reduced to systemic analysis. As much as either liberalism or
neo-orthodoxy, liberation theology realizes that tradition demands its
own continual reinterpretation and, hence, argues that it is the most
appropriate representation of Christianity. Indeed, liberation theology
continues the interpretive role of modern theology: theology mediates
the relation of tradition and existence, interpreting the meaning of
existence in light of tradition and vice versa.
In sum, we might say that liberation theology is as anthropocentric as
most of the rest of modern theology: Christianity is interpreted and lived

in relation to the human subject. Obviously liberation theology is also
related to modern theology by its sources; the philosophical, historical,
and socioscientific re sources that are used by liberation theology are
modern and Western resources. Even the liberation theologians claim
that Marxism -- the source for which they offer an apologetic defense -is a form of modern humanism. Indeed, some liberation theologians
forthrightly claim that they are a response to the second challenge of the
Enlightenment, the challenge to change history. This claim leads one to
wonder if liberation theology is not really the true inheritor of the
Enlightenment tradition of modern theology.
But these arguments and this answer are not fully convincing. One must
also answer the question "is liberation theology really different from
modern theology?" with a resounding yes. With this answer, we must
argue that liberation theology is a new paradigm shift -- a new locus for
theology, a new set of questions, a new way of ordering issues, and the
inclusion of new categories and new metaphors for interpretation. We
can begin the defense for this answer with the most obvious and perhaps
strongest reason for liberation theology's uniqueness: liberation
theology asks a quite different question from that of modern theology,
the question of massive public suffering. For this logos of the Theos,
suffering -- historical, human suffering -- is the focus of attention. As
we have tried to portray repeatedly in this text, suffering -- in liberation
theology -- confronts and disrupts human existence with the hunger of
innocent children, the hopelessness of the poor, the marginalization of
the op pressed, the extermination of the "other," and the agony of the
dispossessed and despised of the earth. Suffering, according to
liberation theology, is the representative experience of being human for
the masses of nonpersons on the fringes or outside of modern history.
Such suffering ruptures our ideologies and illusions about progress and
security, revealing to us that for the majority of our fellow human
beings "progress" and "history" consist of a long, dark night of tragic
terror. Liberation theology stands within this rupture of suffering and
does the traditional work of theology -- it speaks of God. And in this
question of suffering and this speaking of God, a new paradigm of
theology is formed. For liberation theology risks a wager that only by
standing with those who suffer -- the poor and the oppressed, the living
and the dead -- shall we see the reality of human existence through their
eyes and experience in their suffering a God of grace, of hope, of love.
With this wager, liberation theology is radically different from modern
theology. Liberal theologians experienced God in the progress of
history; neo-orthodox theologians experienced God in the existential

event of encounter; liberation theologians experience God in solidarity
with those who suffer. Suffering, in sum, relocates theology -- faith
seeks understanding in the midst of the anguish of history.
The second reason liberation theology is a new paradigm of theology is
its orientation toward transformation rather than understanding as the
reconciliation of human existence and reality. Indeed, the work of Metz
demonstrates that he entered a new theological paradigm as he
recognized the necessity of transformation. Transformation depends on
two essential points: (1) suffering demands transformation, and (2)
human existence is oriented toward trans formation. The first demand
maintains that transformation of the causes of suffering is the urgent
necessity of the moment, and the second demand discloses that
transformation is central to the ontological structure of human
existence. Though liberation theology has, thus far, given most of its
attention to the first demand, it nevertheless assumes the second.
Indeed, the second demand demonstrates one essential agreement
between liberation theology and the philosophy of Marx, namely, that
life implies anticipation, newness, transformation, change, reproduction.
Human subjects are not simply meaning-seekers, hoping to reconcile
themselves to the universe by understanding, but meaning-makers,
determining and deciding their activities within the historical
situatedness of the polis.1
Together the question of suffering and the reality of transformation lead
to the third reason whereby liberation theology differs from modern
theology: the emphasis on praxis. We have explored this emphasis
through liberation theology's anthropology of praxis -- a new
understanding of human existence through the categories of the political
nature, the intersubjective character, and the anticipatory freedom of
human existence. With this third reason, liberation theology is very
much a situated theology. As we have observed at numerous points -without being able to go into a thorough discussion -- much
contemporary reflection is also concerned with the centrality of praxis.
Within liberation theology and other forms of contemporary reflection
there are different approaches to praxis: for some it necessitates the turn
to narrative, for others it forces the turn to specific ideology critique,
while for still others it entails the pragmatics of conversation. The claim
in contemporary reflection and in liberation theology is twofold: life is
fundamentally practical, and the practical needs of the day call for
discernment, judgment, and decision within the polis. Theory, even
practical theory, must now take its role in the polis. The writing of
books -- even the study of history of science -- is a political activity, and
those whose vocation it is to study must now be responsible to the polis
in which they participate as scholars and as human beings.2
Liberation theology thus shares much in common with "practical reason
but it is also a new expression of Christian experience and a new
interpretation of Christian tradition. In liberation theology, Christianity
is located within the practical activity of human existence and as a
specific form of praxis. Christians, as Gutierrez repeatedly emphasizes,
experience God in a praxis of solidarity with the poor that anticipates
new ways of becoming human. Christianity is expressed as a praxis of
solidarity, a way of following Christ by the representation of the
freedom and the preciousness of created existence. The nature of
Christianity as an activity is not, as is sometimes claimed, the reduction
of Christian faith to social action, for in the relocation of liberation
theology the activity of Christianity is both mystical and political, a way
of imitating Christ in the identification of suffering and hope.
Within this enactment of Christ in the world, liberation theologians
offer a quite new interpretation of Christian tradition -- an interpretation
demanded, of course, by the present engagement of tradition and
existence. Central to this interpretation is the metaphor of liberation:
God is liberator in the mediation of liberation and salvation, history is
oriented toward the future in liberating praxis, grace is liberation into
ways of living differently. Like any theology, liberation theology favors
certain Scriptures -- Matthew 25, Luke 4, 1 John, the exodus accounts,
and the prophets. Central to its retrieval and reinterpretation is the belief
that Christianity represents human freedom and the sanctity of created
existence in history, or, as Miguez Bonino might say, Christians obey
God in liberating solidarity with the poor. Christian tradition represents,
as it follows Christ, the gift and the task of freedom.
The final reason is a properly theological reason: liberation theology is a
different understanding of theological reflection. Its reliance on
practical reason, its intent to guide Christian praxis, its emphasis on
narrative, memories, and the social sciences -- all make this theology
look different from its modern predecessors. We have suggested that
one way to approach this new way of doing theology is to consider its
combination -- somewhat and sometimes uneven -- of three
methodological approaches. First, theology is a practical hermeneutics -the ongoing appropriation of Christian tradition and human existence.
Theology is the conversation that we are in, in the constant play of the
narrative structure of human existence and the narratives of tradition
from which we receive our freedom and project our future possibilities.
Second, theology is a critical theory -- a theory of emancipation and
enlightenment concerned with the ideological distortions and systematic
oppressions of all human beings. Theology helps to uncover distortions,
to reveal illusions, to form new consciousness, and to anticipate new
ways of being human. Third, theology claims to be a social theory -- a
theory of a definite praxis. Liberation theology has, at least in this
writer's judgment, emphasized an ideology critique of historical
consciousness and of a philosophy of history that often displaces the
structural realities of human existence. Though it is clear in the ideology
critiques of liberation theologians that social systems oppress the human
subject, it is not equally obvious how systems can or will enable or
structure human freedom. In this claim, theology must study the
interrelation of human activity and social structure; it must, in other
words, carry through on its own social anthropology.
Liberation theology, in sum, both continues and radically departs from
modern theology. As a continuation, liberation theology represents a
radical engagement of Christianity with the world, with the intent to
represent human freedom and God's gratuitous activity in the questions
and issues of the day. As a radically new paradigm and departure from
modern theology, liberation theology reflects and guides a Christianity
that is identified with those who suffer, that represents a freedom of
transformation, and that proclaims a God whose love frees us for justice
and faith. Modern theology is the heritage of liberation theology, and
from it liberation theologians must both distance themselves and return
to draw the resources and visions of a project of human freedom.
Liberation theology's journey is, however, radically its own: a journey
with the despised and dispossessed of history; a journey dependent upon
a wager of faith seeking understanding in the identification of suffering
and hope with a God who creates, redeems, and liberates all creation.
NOTES:
1. Nicholas Lobkowicz, Theory and Practice: History of a Concept
from Aristotle to Marx (South Bend, Ind.: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1967), pp. 340-41.

2. See Frank Lentriccha, Criticism and Social Change (Chicago, Ill.:
University of Chicago Press, 1983).

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The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering by Rebecca S. Chopp

Chapter 1: Latin American Liberation Theology

Chapter 2: Political Theology

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Chapter 3: Gustavo Gutierrez: A Theology for Historical Amnesia

Chapter 4: Johann Baptist Metz: The Subject of Suffering

Chapter 5: Jose Miguez Bonino: The Conversion to the World

Chapter 6: Jurgen Moltmann: The Language of God as the Language

Chapter 7: Christ Liberating Culture

Chapter 8: Toward Praxis: A Method for Liberation Theology

The Praxis of Suffering

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The Praxis of Suffering by Rebecca S.

The Praxis of Suffering

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intensity of the holocaust. The terrors of nature have tended to take a

The Praxis of Suffering

suffering cannot be conveyed in pure facts and figures, reportings that

The Praxis of Suffering

region of social ethics, prophetic declarations, or charitable service.

The Praxis of Suffering

to the focal center of the liberating activity of God. With God's

The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering

Gustavo Gutierrez, a Roman Catholic theologian from Peru; Johann

The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering

Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics and Praxis

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The Praxis of Suffering by Rebecca S.

Chapter 1: Latin American Liberation

The Praxis of Suffering

situation."2 These assumptions force our theology to be concrete and

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work do so for almost nothing. According to Arthur McGovern,

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The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering

movements, even though it realized that independence would result in

The Praxis of Suffering

Latin America through economic investments in sugar plantations, the

The Praxis of Suffering

of multinational corporations. The first stage of this period, in the 1950s

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The Praxis of Suffering

human rights.27 Vatican II documents such as Populorum Progressio

The Praxis of Suffering

the problems of the community and of social structures. We must

The Praxis of Suffering

The Praxis of Suffering

understand their context and their history as being structurally,