Por: Luis N. Rivera-Pagán, Puerto Rico
In memory of Marcella Althaus-Reid
A theological enfant terrible
Liberation theology was the unforeseen enfant terrible in the academic and ecclesial realms of theological production during the last decades of the twentieth century. It brought to the conversation not only a new theme – liberation – but also a new perspective on doing theology and a novel way of referring to God’s being and action in history. Its project to reconfigure the interplay between religious studies, history, and politics became a meaningful and unavoidable topic of analysis and dialogue in the general theological discourse. This has led many scholars to perceive in its emergence a drastic epistemological rupture, a radical change in paradigm, a significant shift in both the ecclesial and social role of theology.
Its origins are diverse, and not only native to theological and ecclesiastical horizons. One important source, neglected by some clerical accounts, was the complex constellation of liberation struggles during the sixties and early seventies. It was a time of social turmoil, when many things seemed out of joint: a strong anti war movement protest, mainly directed against American military intervention in Vietnam and the global nuclear threat, a spread of decolonization movements all over the Third World, the feminist struggle against masculine patriarchy, a robust challenge to racial bigotry, the Stonewall rebellion (June/69) against homophobia and gay discrimination, student protests in Paris, Prague, Mexico, and New York in opposition to repressive states of all stripes, guerilla insurgencies and social unrest in many Latin American nations. Many of these agents of social protest adopted the title of “liberation movement” as their public card of presentation. “Fronts of national liberation” flourished all over the Third World.1
Another significant factor was the development of a non-dogmatic Marxism that read Marx’s texts as an ethical critique on human oppression and as a projection of a utopian non-oppressive future, sort of a kingdom of freedom. This heterodox way of reading Marx, by authors like the German philosopher Ernst Bloch, made possible something up to then considered unthinkable, a constructive and affirmative dialogue between theology and Marxism, at the margins of church and party hierarchies rigid orthodoxies. Influential in this intellectual milieu was Bloch’s 1968 Atheismus im Christentum,2 whose hermeneutical performance diagnoses inside the biblical texts a struggle between the voices of the oppressors and those of the oppressed and provocatively asserts that whoever wants to be a good Marxist should constantly read the Bible (and vice versa, whoever wants to be a good Christian should have Marx as bedside reading).
Other iconoclast authors like Herbert Marcuse and Franz Fanon were passionately read from Buenos Aires to Berlin, from Berkeley to Nairobi, with intentionalities not limited to academia.3 Exiled from Brazil, Paulo Freire delivered scathing critiques of traditional educational systems and promoted a pedagogy for the liberation of the oppressed.4 Martin Luther King, Jr. and Ernesto “Che” Guevara are probably the main emblematic icons and martyrs of those turbulent times. Paul Éluard’s poem Liberté, recited and sang in many languages, became its poetic hymn.
Within the churches important processes were taking place. Pope John XIII summoned, to the surprise of many, the Second Vatican Council. Progressive Roman Catholic theologians consider Vatican II an important turning point in the modern history of their church.5According to their interpretation, the council had three main objectives.
In memory of Marcella Althaus-Reid
A theological enfant terrible
Liberation theology was the unforeseen enfant terrible in the academic and ecclesial realms of theological production during the last decades of the twentieth century. It brought to the conversation not only a new theme – liberation – but also a new perspective on doing theology and a novel way of referring to God’s being and action in history. Its project to reconfigure the interplay between religious studies, history, and politics became a meaningful and unavoidable topic of analysis and dialogue in the general theological discourse. This has led many scholars to perceive in its emergence a drastic epistemological rupture, a radical change in paradigm, a significant shift in both the ecclesial and social role of theology.
Its origins are diverse, and not only native to theological and ecclesiastical horizons. One important source, neglected by some clerical accounts, was the complex constellation of liberation struggles during the sixties and early seventies. It was a time of social turmoil, when many things seemed out of joint: a strong anti war movement protest, mainly directed against American military intervention in Vietnam and the global nuclear threat, a spread of decolonization movements all over the Third World, the feminist struggle against masculine patriarchy, a robust challenge to racial bigotry, the Stonewall rebellion (June/69) against homophobia and gay discrimination, student protests in Paris, Prague, Mexico, and New York in opposition to repressive states of all stripes, guerilla insurgencies and social unrest in many Latin American nations. Many of these agents of social protest adopted the title of “liberation movement” as their public card of presentation. “Fronts of national liberation” flourished all over the Third World.1
Another significant factor was the development of a non-dogmatic Marxism that read Marx’s texts as an ethical critique on human oppression and as a projection of a utopian non-oppressive future, sort of a kingdom of freedom. This heterodox way of reading Marx, by authors like the German philosopher Ernst Bloch, made possible something up to then considered unthinkable, a constructive and affirmative dialogue between theology and Marxism, at the margins of church and party hierarchies rigid orthodoxies. Influential in this intellectual milieu was Bloch’s 1968 Atheismus im Christentum,2 whose hermeneutical performance diagnoses inside the biblical texts a struggle between the voices of the oppressors and those of the oppressed and provocatively asserts that whoever wants to be a good Marxist should constantly read the Bible (and vice versa, whoever wants to be a good Christian should have Marx as bedside reading).
Other iconoclast authors like Herbert Marcuse and Franz Fanon were passionately read from Buenos Aires to Berlin, from Berkeley to Nairobi, with intentionalities not limited to academia.3 Exiled from Brazil, Paulo Freire delivered scathing critiques of traditional educational systems and promoted a pedagogy for the liberation of the oppressed.4 Martin Luther King, Jr. and Ernesto “Che” Guevara are probably the main emblematic icons and martyrs of those turbulent times. Paul Éluard’s poem Liberté, recited and sang in many languages, became its poetic hymn.
Within the churches important processes were taking place. Pope John XIII summoned, to the surprise of many, the Second Vatican Council. Progressive Roman Catholic theologians consider Vatican II an important turning point in the modern history of their church.5According to their interpretation, the council had three main objectives.
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