,~,"-,~'-"~~~1""'-. '" c,;c - "~.;-~ -"".f'" ~,j.". t;':~c~..[-,~~-- /3. Leonardo Boffand-Clodovis BoffLIBERATION THEOLOGY: FROM CONFRONTATIONTO DIALOGUE (1985)Since the earliest Spanish and Portuguese conquests in the New World, theCatholic Church's relationship with ruling secular authorities in Latin Americahas been marked by extreme contrasts. On the one hand, many bishops andother powerful clerics have supported various authoritarian regimes and rigidsocial hierarchies, seeing them as part of the divine order. On the other hand,numerous individual priests, brothers, and nuns have attempted to correct,sometimes by revolutionary means, the profound economic and political in-equity that still characterizes many nations of Central and South America. In thewake of the reform council Vatican II (1962-1965), the forces of social changewere given an enormous boost when the Latin American Bishops' Conference"(CELAM) issued a scathing indictment of "institutional violence" at its 1968 ~meeting in Medellin, Colombia. This document, sometimes referred to as the iMagna Carta of the liberation theology movement, inspired several activistLiberation Theology: From Confrontation to Dialogue (1985) 505clerics to use ever more radical interpretations of church doctrine to justify theirown involvement in political reform. The most famous of these have been thePeruvian theologian Gustavo Gutierrez (b. 1928) and the Brazilian Franciscanand theologian Leonardo Boff (b. 1938). In the following defense of liberationtheology, written with his brother and fellow theologian Clodovis, Boff rejectsassertions that Christianity must remain apolitical or neutral in the face of masssocial injustice. His theologically based demands for a fundamental restructur-ing of Latin American societies, combined with his frequent reliance on Marxistterminology, resulted in his suspension from teaching by Pope John Paul II in1984. By the time this work was published a year later, the ban on Boff waslifted, but he eventually left the priesthood in 1992. The term "liberation theol-ogy" has since come to be applied to other oppressed groups as well, particularlywomen and African-Americans.. . . Before the emergence of a theology of liber- by reading books and articles. The books andation at the close of the 1960s, a full-fledged articles absolutely must be connected with theliberation praxis was already under way in Latin soil of the Church and of society, from whichAmerica. Before liberation theology there were these writings have sptung, inasmuch as theythe prophetic bishop, the committed lay per- seek to interpret and illuminate that Churchson, and liberation communities. A life practice and that society.was well under way even in the early 1960s. It is only within a process, then, a fabric whoseThe theology of liberation, then, came in a "sec- warp and woof are suffering and hope, that lib-ond moment." It came as the expression of this eration theology is born, and therefore under-liberation praxis on the part of the Church. Lib- stood. From above, or from without, there is noeration theology is the theology of a liberation understanding it at all. We might even go soChurch-a Church with a preferential option far as to say that the theology of liberation canfor solidarity with the poor. be understood only by two groupings of per-Of course, the theology of liberation is not sons: the poor, and those who sttuggle for jus-the mere reflex of a liberation faith. It is also a tice at their side--only by those who hungerreflection on that faith-an in-depth explana- for bread, and by.those who hunger for justicetion, a purification, a systematization of that in solidarity with those hungering for bread.faith. In other words: liberation theology en- Conversely, liberation theology is not under-lightens and stimulates the life and practice of stood, nor can it be understood, by the satiatedthe actual, concrete Church. and satisfied-by those comfortable with theTo be sure, a reciprocal relation obtains be- status quo.tween action and reflection-faith action and The implication here is that, down at thetheological reflection in the Church maintain a "base," antecedent to all theologizing, is an op-two-way relationship. Still, theology is more an tion for life, a particular, determinate faith ex-effect than a cause of the practice of faith, and it perience, the taking of a position vis-a-vis theis a cause only because it is an effect. concrete world in which we live. It is from aRemoved from its Sitz im Leben [lit., "seat in pre-theological element as one's starting point, .life") withdrawn from the vital context of its then, that one is totally "for," or totallyorigin and development, the theology of libera- "against," the theology of liberation.tion becomes altogether incomprehensible. Lib- In other words, it is crucial to grasp lib-eration theology cannot be understood merely eration theology in its locus. Theologians of- -~506 Chapter lOW estern Christianity and Contemporary Societyliberation must be read not in the ivory towers and the "light of the world" [Mt 5:13-14}, as theof certain departments of theology (to borrow theological virtue of charity exercised in thean image from Pope John Paul II), but in the area of the social.slums, in the miserable neighborhoods of the More simply, the theology of liberation is re-destitute, in the factories, on the plantations- flection on the life of the Christian communitywherever an oppressed people live, suffer, from a standpoint of its contribution to libera-struggle, and die. tion. "Life" here is a richer and more flexibleTo pretend to "discuss liberation theology" concept than that of "praxis," which is an exter-without seeing the poor is to miss the whole point, nal activity of historical transformation. Wefor one fails to see the central problem of the might be tempted to represent the theology oftheology being discussed.