The Lived Theology of Desmond Tutu

Peter Zylstra-Moore
Third World Theology
November 12, 2009

Dear Child of God, before we can become God’s partner’s, we must know
what God wants for us. “I have a dream,” God says. “Please help Me to
realize it.” It is a dream of a world whose ugliness and squalor and poverty,
its war and hostility, it greed and harsh competitiveness, its alienation and
disharmony are changed into their glorious counterparts, when there will be
more laughter, joy, and peace, where there will be justice and goodness and
compassion and love and caring and sharing. I have a dream that swords will
be beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, that My children
will know that they are member of one family, the human family, God’s
family, My Family. In God’s family, there are no outsiders. All are insiders.
Black and white, rich and poor, gay and straight, Jew and Arab, Palestinian
and Israeli, Roman Catholic and Protestant, Serb and Albanian, Hutu and
Tutsi, Muslim and Christian, Buddhist and Hindu, Pakistani and Indian—all
belong.1 (Desmond Tutu)

1 Tutu, Desmond, God has a Dream, 19-20

 The last sermon I shared with my home church as a youth pastor was
on homosexuality. It was a pointed sermon on both what I perceived as the
sinful reality of homosexuality, but also on the church's call to love sinners.
As I continued to seek God, I eventually began to question whether on this
issue like other issues in Church history, from colonialism, to woman's rights,
to civil rights most of the church, myself included were, when historically
relevant, on the side of injustice. I began to resonate with the words of
Martin Luther King Jr.: (The Christian Church is) “the greatest preserver of the
status quo” , “one of the chief exponents of racial bigotry... I can conclude
that the church, in its present state, is not the hope of the world. I believe
that nothing has so persistently and effectively blocked the way of salvation
2
as the church.” As I read about how Jesus balanced traditions and their
authority, with the prescient social issues of his time, I came to study social
leaders from both the first and third worlds and how they spoke to the issues
affecting the developing world.3 I wanted to understand what it was about
certain people’s faith (or beliefs) that allowed them to speak prophetically.
This desire soon led me to the works of Desmond Tutu whom I quickly came
to love. If the church is to become the hope of the world it must begin to
listen to it's prophets, people like Desmond Tutu. This paper will look at
Desmond Tutu’s liberating theology as demonstrated in his writing and in his
actions, the varying influences contributing to his theological understandings
and conclude by exploring what this means for the church.
Theology
For Tutu, faith and truth are discovered and nurtured through stillness
and contemplation. Theology begins in contemplative prayer and meditation.
“We can hear God's voice most clearly when we are quiet, uncluttered and
undistracted—when we are still.”4 Tutu is often asked about the source of his
joy and quickness to laugh, despite his real experiences of injustice. He
replies that “I can honestly say that it comes from my spiritual life—and from

2 King Jr, Martin Luther, http://mlk-

kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/news/article/volume_vi_martin_luther_king_jr_questioned_issues
_of_faith_new_volume_revea/
3 I understand the third world loosely as those who are excluded in some way (economically,
socially) from the first world (the accepted rights, power, etc) of the minority who hold power
in our world.
4 Tutu, Desmond, Ibid 100.
specifically these times of stillness.”5 The importance of the contemplative
life marked his influence on organizations he was involved in. While heading
the South African Council of Churches (SACC), Tutu introduced to the staff
compulsory prayers, regular Bible studies, monthly Eucharists, and silent
retreats.6
Through contemplation Tutu has been led towards a clear and consistent
picture of what “God's dream is for the world.” Tutu believes that we are
called to transfigure the world towards God’s dream; a world where “there
will be more laughter, joy, and peace, where there will be justice and
goodness and compassion and love and caring and sharing.”7
The foundation of this dream is loving community. The basis for our
ability to love comes from understanding and contemplating God’s
unconditional love for us. It is through this knowledge that we are able to
love ourselves and therefore others.8 Tutu actively sought to help his peers
develop this self-love. A bishop described the impact of Tutu as General
Secretary of the South African Council of Churches: “We bishops were
encouraged to discover... the truth about ourselves ... the child within, the
more feminine traits, the authentic person. Out of this emerged a leadership
more free to acknowledge human frailty, to laugh or cry, not to take
ourselves too seriously...(H)e brought a new and wholesome liberty into (our)
lives.”9 Tutu's comfort with himself came from his understanding of God's
unconditional love. This confidence allowed him to help others become
comfortable with themselves. Tutu believes that with God's unconditional
love, comes our need for God. As our capacity to love ourselves
unconditionally grows, so does our capacity to love others.
For Tutu, love requires freedom to choose, which has very real world
consequences. It is Tutu's belief that though we are all capable of incredible
evil comparable to the perpetrators of apartheid in South Africa or genocide
in Rwanda, this is not the normal state of affairs. Following Ghandi, Tutu
suggests that for every evil act, dozens of good acts go unnoticed. It is
5 Ibid 101
6 Allen, John, Rabble Rouser for Peace, 169.
7 Tutu, Desmond, pg 20 (This section will largely depend on what Tutu describes as “the
cumulative expression of my life's work” (pg IX))
8 Ibid 29.
9 Ibid, 279.
because evil deeds are the exception that they are considered newsworthy.10
For Tutu, it is this incredible gap between the loving choices God wants us to
make, and the evil we are capable of committing, which leads him to suggest
that to be authentically human is to make such choices.
This inherent choice at the very centre of humanity, despite setbacks, is
the reason for Tutu that the universe is moving towards increasing freedom.
Regimes and systems that extend certain peoples' freedoms over others' will
ultimately fail. This is why, for Tutu, the political expansion of freedom is a
religious experience. “Our elections turned out to be a spiritual, even a
religious experience...People waited for a very long time...(in fact it became)
a new status symbol.” The fact that their was no violence, or that people that
had “known separation and apartheid for so long,” now stood in line, shared
newspapers and stories together made the experience spiritual. “People
entered the booth one person and emerged on the other side a totally
different person...Yes, our first election turned out to be a deeply spiritual
even, a religious experience, a transfiguration experience, a mountaintop
experience.”11
For Tutu, freedom is not strictly in the North American sense of
individual rights,12 but is intended and necessary as the basis for all authentic
relationships, with God and with each other.13 For Tutu, God’s intention is not
for an individualistic freedom but rather equal freedom of place for people
within the context of relationships. The goal of freedom is to move the world
towards God’s dream for it, to move it towards loving relationship. Thus for
Tutu, leadership whether political or otherwise is meant to be democratic and
consensus-building. As leader of the SACC, Tutu would often send arguing
leaders away overnight to come to a shared compromise, rather than
allowing for divisive votes.14 Internationally, he has “urged governments to
negotiate (even) with those they regarded as terrorists.”15 The goal is not
only justice but also relationship.

10 Ibid. 12-13
11 Tutu 6, 7.
12 Ibid 28. Tutu recognizes that the West has lost it’s notion of interdependence in becoming
a highly individualistic society.
13 Ibid. 13
14 Allen, John, 279.
15 Allen, John, 381.
 At the basis of freedom is the goal of reciprocating the unconditional
love of God. Tutu recognizes this love is bigger than our prejudices. If we
understand the unconditional love of God, we also understand that “God's
love is too great to be confined to any side of a conflict or to any religion. And
our prejudices, regardless of whether they are based on religion, race,
nationality, gender, sexual orientation or anything else, are absolutely and
utterly ridiculous in God's eyes.”16 In fact, Tutu suggests “Our God is a God
who has a bias for the weak, and we who worship this God... have no option
but to have a like special concern for those who are pushed to the edges of
society, for those who because they are different seem to have no voice.”17
Tutu has been incredibly prophetic in calling prejudices what they are
whether they are prejudices directed at him as in the case of apartheid, or
prejudices that are directed towards others. He was involved in pushing the
South African Council of Churches to accept women in leadership positions.
Tutu would eventually be a voice for attempting to change the South African
Anglican Church's position from accepting celibate homosexuals to allowing
homosexuals to consummate their love. Tutu suggested that “given the kind
of treatment homosexuals get in society...it would be one of the most stupid
things to say, 'That this is what they want to be.'” In apartheid blacks “were
being blamed and made to suffer for something we could do nothing about. It
is the same for homosexuality.” Therefore, “Why should we want all
homosexual persons not to give expression to their sexuality in loving acts?”
The end of injustice was not just passive in the sense of not actively
violating someone else but active, in bringing to end pain and suffering. Tutu
is able to praise the end of apartheid while criticizing the ANC for the way
poverty has actually worsened in South Africa. His sense of right and wrong is
grounded in the real world of suffering. This at times has placed Tutu in
heated debates within the church, on issues such as contraception in
response to the AIDS problem.18
Understanding God's unconditional love not only undermines our
prejudices and calls us to repentance for them, but it also calls us to love

16 Ibid 43, 44.

17 Ibid 66
18 Allen, John 150.
those who have wronged us. Because God loves even our enemies, the goal
must be restored loving relationships or reconciliation. The pathway for Tutu
“is based on forgiveness, and forgiveness is based on true confession, and
confession is based on penitence, on contrition, on sorrow for what you have
done” “and reparation.”19 Of course reconciliation is a two-way street but it
begins with an individual choosing to love (which does not necessarily mean
like), and as we choose to “act lovingly you can begin to feel love.” Tutu
suggests that our ability to love comes from our recognition that we are or
could be “the aggressor rather than the victim” and are “all flawed.”20 This
humility leads to generosity in the recognition that what we have is not
earned outside the support of our community and nor is it individually ours.
Pursuing the reconciling love of God called Tutu to at times work as a
pastor, or General Secretary of the South African Council of Church's, or the
Archbishop of Capetown. At other times it called him to get involved in
healing South Africa's brokenness through the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission in Africa. Tutu's own unconditional and reconciling love led him
to love and to cry with both victims and oppressors as people sought
reconciliation.
For Tutu, the pathway to loving and restored relationships also involves
active confrontation of injustice. In fact, because real relationships requires
equality and freedom from guilt requires an end to injustice, the end of
injustice is freeing for both the oppressor and oppressed because freedom is
indivisible.21 Thus their is a need to end injustice. Tutu's active resistance to
injustice was most often accomplished through non-violent active resistance.
Though Tutu empathized with violent responses to the injustice of apartheid,
he condemned violence on either side of the apartheid struggle. Tutu's non-
violence was an active non-violence that directly condemned, protested, and
deliberately disregarded and disobeyed apartheid laws, and called for the
world community to disinvest and sanction Apartheid South Africa.22 For Tutu,
non-violent resistance is a more peaceful means to accomplish a goal, is
often more realistic in accomplishing it's goals, and is very often the only way

19 Tutu, 53,57
20 Ibid 81
21 Ibid, 7
22 Allen, John, 174.
resistance can avoid perpetrating a greater injustice than that which it
opposes. For Tutu this does not mean that violence is never warranted in
opposing injustice but rather that most of the time it is unwarranted.23 Tutu
has since called for support to similar disinvestment and sanctions towards
Israel, and called for non-violent active resistance by Palestinians in response
to the expansion of settlements into the UN recognized Palestine and also
more recently in response to the Gaza Massacre.24
Because for Tutu, the goal is loving relationships, the pathway towards
that goal is also relational. It is not just God working, but God working
through his people. God needs us. God is in the world transfiguring it towards
freedom, familial relationship25, and love, and in this he actually needs our
help.26 We continue to hear God’s dream through prophets throughout
history, through Jesus, and today from great leaders like Gandhi and Martin
Luther King Jr. Tutu learned about God and his dream not only through
meditation but also from his experiences of God in others.
Tutu’s Theological Influences:
Tutu’s is strongly influenced by the Bible, African expressions of
Spirituality (Christian and traditional), Black liberation theology, historical
experiences of God, and through people. These influences all interact
relationally with each other, because for Tutu, no person or tradition could
sum up an omniscient God. Similarly, no person or tradition could be
completely opposed to God. This is not to suggest that Tutu does not hold
strong definitions of truth, but rather that we, and our traditions at times
reflect and other times fail to reflect God. Spirituality is discovered through
the living presence of God in all persons and traditions.
For Tutu it is equally important that theology be contextual. People
should not take theology and questions from one setting and carry them into
very different settings with very different questions. Instead we must seek to
contextualize theology to answer “the all consuming questions.” Thus
theological importance is synonymous with social and practical relevance.

23 Allen, John. Pg 174, 212.

24 About Desmond and Leah Tutu, http://www.tutu.org/bio-desmond-tutu.php
25 See initial quote, and see also Tutu, 20, 25
26 Ibid 15
 Tutu sees scriptures as incredibly socially relevant. He consistently
uses the language and stories of scriptures to communicate spiritual truths.
But more than just language, he sees God as active in scriptures in speaking
to injustice, and in reconciling and transfiguring brokenness. Tutu sees the
God of the Bible, of the Exodus, and the God of Jesus as “a God of justice and
liberation and goodness.”27
It is this understanding of God which he understands personally, and
sees reflected in much of the Bible which also allows Tutu to criticize
scriptures as well. Part of this criticism is directed at interpretations of
scriptures that “focus on concrete images of God and on overly literal
readings of the Bible.” For instance for Tutu, Jesus' resurrection is “not (about)
the revivification of a corpse” but rather the reality “that Jesus Christ is
risen”, that he is “accessible to me” and continues “to make a difference to
me.”28 Part of Tutu's criticism is directed toward scripture itself; and how
Christians fail to recognize that “it was written by human beings” and is “not
something dropped from heaven, written by the hand of God.” Thus Tutu can
allow the Spirit of God to criticize “the parts of the Bible that have no
permanent worth.”29
One of Tutu’s social theological influences is African theology. Tutu
believes that one question Africans needed to answer was how to “replace an
alien, imported way of expressing their faith with one that was authentically
African.” Tutu responded critically to the aspect of missionary activity that
forced Africans to condemn “virtually all things African(...). (E)ven(...) their
beautiful African names were considered heathen.”30 Tutu sees how African
Christians are“shuttling back and forth between worlds, during the day being
respectable western-type Christians and at night consulting traditional
doctors.”31 Tutu stands with African traditions in suggesting that the west has
lost something in our overemphasis on individuality. We have lost our link to

27 Allen, John. 164.

28 Tutu, Desmond, 107
29 Ibid 106
30 Allen, John, pg 136.
31 Ibid.
our community, and our ancestors: Humanity “is linked backwards to the
ancestors whom he reveres and forward with all generations yet unborn.”32
One of Tutu’s most common references to African spirituality is the
Bantu concept of ubuntu. Ubuntu recognizes that the essence of being a
person is, “that we are people through other people... (and) (t)hat we can’t
be fully human alone. God keeps trying to make us realize that we are made
for interdependence, we are made for family...(for) embrace...
generous(ity)...compassion.” He suggests if we truly embraced ubuntu, war,
oppression and inequality would quickly end.33
Tutu’s social theology was also influenced by black liberation theology.
The second most important question Tutu sees facing African Christians is
“how to liberate people from bondage.” Thus he sees the need to integrate
African and black theology. Tutu says, “I fear that African theology has failed
to produce a sufficiently sharp cutting edge... Very little has been offered
that is pertinent, say, about the theology of power in the face of the epidemic
of coups and military rule, about development, about poverty.” In the same
way that African Christianity needs to be discovered through African
spirituality, ‘black’ empowerment needed to come from black theology. Tutu
wrote,
(M)ost reactions to blackness are negative ones. This borne out
to a great degree by language... a rotten mood... (is a) black
mood, the bad exception is the black sheep... (G)ood angels are
white, the devil and his angels are black...black... (means)
death, ... white...life... (I)t is not long before... a black person
wonders whether you are not as they depict you... The term
“black” has been quite deliberately adopted so that we can
describe ourselves positively. It is an assertion of our
personhood, our identity in its own right, not (against) ...
anyone else. We have to say it over and over again... until we
believe it... We matter, we are alive and kicking and black is
beautiful... Black theology is an engaged not academic,
detached theology... relating to real concerns... Black
theology... is to ask whose side is God; it is to be concerned
about the humanization of man, because those who ravage our
humanity dehumanize themselves in the process... It is a
clarion call for man to align himself with God who is the God of
the Exodus, God the liberator, who leads his people, all his

32 Ibid. 137
33 Rodger, Ann, A Grand Reception for Archbishop Tutu,
http://www.postgazette.com/pg/07299/828628-85.stm#ixzz0W7Gb00Kj
 people, out of all kinds of bondage-political, economic, cultural,
the bondage of sin and disease, into the glorious liberty of the
(per)sons of God.”34
Tutu is influenced and sees the need for “African Christians” to be influenced
by theologies that are their own, and that speak clearly and ethically to
racism and abuses of power.
Tutu suggest that “all of God’s Children and their different faiths help
us to realize the immensity of God,” that we learn about the social theology
of God from learning to see him in everyone even those who do not “believe
in God.” This is why Tutu was so inspired by the prophets of his time, in
Ghandi and then Martin Luther King Jr, in determining what non-violent direct
action might look like against apartheid.
This is also why Tutu says that the agnostic Dalai Lama, the Tibetan
Buddhist leader through his patience and love despite exile for nearly 50
years is the image of God. “Although others would be embittered, the Dalai
Lama is filled with ‘bubbly joyousness’. ‘You have to be totally, totally
insensitive not to know you are in the presence of someone who is holy and
good.’” He suggests that God cannot therefore be understood fully in any
person or religion, nor does any person or religion fail in any way to
somewhat reflect God:
You do not have to believe in God to know that stealing is bad...
(In fact) all of us are fundamentally good. The aberration is the
bad person. God is not upset that Gandhi was not a Christian,
because God is not a Christian. All of God's children and their
different faiths help us to realize the immensity of God. No faith
contains the whole truth about God. And certainly Christians
don't have a corner on God. All of us belong to God. Even the
nonbeliever is precious to God.35

For Tutu, faith requires restoring the image of God and the inherent
value of your self and your tradition, while learning from other people’s faith
and tradition, in “realiz(ing) the immensity of God.” “Distinct world view(s)
(are) not necessarily better or superior to those of other people. It is just
different and needs to be balanced by those of other people.”36

34 Allen, John, pg 138-139.

35 Tutu, Desmond, Questions and Answer on Desmond Tutu's God Has a Dream,
http://www.godhasadream.com/media/Desmond_Tutu_Q_and_A.pdf
36 Tutu, Desmond, An African Prayer Book, pg XIV.
Conclusion
Tutu's life cannot be understood outside of this simple theology which

begins with a relational understanding of God, who loves us and who seeks

for us to have free and loving relationships with Herself, and with each other.

I believe that much of what allows Tutu to speak prophetically and

consistently in a liberating manner is the way he understands God's

unconditional love for him. In his struggle to liberate black South Africans this

led Tutu to point them towards their own worth in themselves, and in their

traditions. This required an understanding of authentic African spiritual

traditions, and in their own expressions of Christianity, whether in American

Black Theology or African Theology. Rooted in the Christian tradition, Tutu is

obvious, that liberating one's own traditions does not mean a denial of real

truth in other traditions. This is also apparent in his unapologetic support for

biblical reconciliation through repentance, forgiveness and reparation. Tutu

has not allowed his own situation of oppression to narrow his definitions of

liberation to his own cause. Tutu manages to balance a strong respect for

tradition with genuine questions of what justice looks like today.

If the Christian church is going to move from being “the greatest

supporter of the status quo” to a prominent voice for justice, it must begin by

helping the marginalized love themselves and their histories. We need to

relate with others equally. This requires a real intention to learn something

new about God or truth through others, and genuinely engaging with them in

our movement towards truth. This is more than a superficial affirmation that

others may have something to teach us about our own traditions, rather it is

recognition that there are profoundly new and beautiful things in the
incredible mix of people around us. Faith needs to be about seeking and

questioning God, rather than defending our god. In the same way that most

prophets, from the Old Testament, to Jesus, and also the many different

reformers in church history, aligned themselves with the marginalized and

were ostracized for it by the official Church (of their time), Tutu to the extent

that his perspectives are actually known is a controversial figure. If the

church is going to contribute to the realization of God's Dream it needs to

begin learning from rather than stoning its' current prophets.

 Works Cited

About Desmond and Leah Tutu, recovered November 10, 2009,

http://www.tutu.org/bio-desmond-tutu.php

Allen, John, Rabble-Rouser for Peace; the authorized biography of Desmond Tutu,
Free Press, New York, 2006.

King Jr, Martin Luther, Martin Luther King Jr, January 8, 2008, http://mlk-
kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/news/article/volume_vi_martin_luther_king_jr_que
stioned_issues_of_faith_new_volume_revea/

Rodger, Ann, A Grand Reception for Archbishop Tutu, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,

October 26, 2007, http://www.postgazette.com/pg/07299/828628-
85.stm#ixzz0W7Gb00Kj

Tutu, Desmond, An African Prayer Book, Doubleday, Toronto, 1995.

Tutu, Desmond, God has a Dream, Doubleday, Toronto, 2004

Tutu, Desmond, No Future without Forgiveness, Rider, London, 1999

Tutu, Desmond, Questions and Answers for Desmond Tutu's God has a Dream,
recovered November 8, 2009,
http://www.godhasadream.com/media/Desmond_Tutu_Q_and_A.pdf

Tutu, Desmond, The Rainbow People of God; The Making of a Peaceful Revolution,
Doubleday, New York, 1994.