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The Rise and Fall of Liberation Theology? An Evaluative Chronicle
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2024
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Liberation theology emerged gradually in the period following the Second Vatican Council. At that Council there were present, as influences on the conciliar process, a wide variety of theologies- Neo-Scholastic, Neopatristic, anthropologico-transcendental (alias Karl Rahner), as well as the inter-related theologies of the ‘signs of the times’ and of ‘earthly realities’, the latter soon to be dubbed ‘secularisation-theology’ and chiefly worked out, like its brother movement, by the French. As succeeding events have demonstrated, the resultant compound was unstable. So far as the Americas were concerned although ‘CELAM’, the Latin American Episcopal Council, had functioned since 19S6, the Latin American influence at Vatican II, whether of bishops or theologians was negligible, with the exception of one or two individual voices like the Brazilian Helder Camara, archbishop of Recife, who contributed to the making of the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modem World.
Very different, during the Council’s closing sessions, was the state of affairs in Latin America itself. There a veritable theological ferment was brewing, as became clear from four meetings of theologians held at, successively, Petrdpolis (Brazil), Havana (Cuba), Bogota (Colombia) and Cuernavaca (Mexico) in the course of 1964-1965. What transpired from these pan-Latin American theological assemblies was the need for a new theology whose nature would be determined by, first, the conciliar ‘renewal’, but also by, secondly, confrontation with the often cruel human reality of that continent.
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- Copyright © 1991 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
References
1 For documentation, see Chenu, B. and Lauret, B. (eds.). Théologies dt la libération. Documentation et débats (Paris 1955)Google Scholar, This collection includes a French translation of M. Alcalá's account of the history of liberation theology up to the early 1980's, which originally appeared in Spanish in Razón y Fe for June 1984, and to which the early sections of my article are indebted. See also now Hennelly, A. T. (ed.). Liberation Theology. A Documentary History (Maryknoll 1990)Google Scholar.
2 The original inspiration of ‘historic theology’ is best reflected in the work of the Argentinian E. Dussel, who combines liberation theology with Church history, as in his History and the Theology of Liberation (Et New York 1976)Google Scholar; A History of the Church in Latin America (Et Grand Rapids 1981)Google Scholar.
3 The background was the Bandung Conference of 1955 with in deepened awareness of third world countries. Also of this phase was the creation in 1968 by the Pontifical Commission on Justice and Peace together with the World Council of Churches of the joint venture ‘SODEPAX’: the Committee on Society, Development and Peace. See e.g. for the theology of development and its ethics: Dunne, G. H., The Right to Development (New York 1974)Google Scholar; Goulet, D., The Cruel Choice: A New Concept on the Theory of Development (New York 1971)Google Scholar; and some remarks in Moltmann, J., The Crucified God: the Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian Theology (Et New York 1974), pp. 317–340Google Scholar.
4 For the text, see “The Medellín statement by the Bishops of Latin America”, New Blackfriars 50. 582 (November 1968). pp, 72–78Google Scholar.
5 Gutiérrez, G., A Theology of Liberation (Et New York 1973; London 1974)Google Scholar; Boff, L., Jesus Christ Liberator (Et London 1980).Google Scholar
6 Gutiérrez, , We Drink from Our Own Wells (Et New York 1984)Google Scholar; a parallel attempt to provide a spirituality for liberation theology would be Boff, L. and Boff, G, Salvation and Liberation: In Search of a Balance between Faith and Politics (Et New York 1984)Google Scholar.
7 J. L. Segundo's, five volume Teologia abierta para el laico adulto is perhaps the fullest attempt to provide for Church workers a theology so understood. In his manifesto The Liberation of Theology (ET Maryknoll 1982), he proposes a ministerial training composed partly of the study of social pathology, and partly of the critical use of Scripture and Church dogma, ‘suspecting that the whole present way of training clergy or pastoral agents is merely a way for society to protect itself right from the start from theologians by replacing their ability to analyse and criticise with endless erudite bibliographies’, ibid., p.xvi.
8 See for example Kloppenburg, B. O. F. M., Temptations for the Theology of Liberation (Et Chicago 1974)Google Scholar; Wagner, C. P., Latin American Theology: Radical or Evangelical? (Grand Rapids 1970)Google Scholar.
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16 Congrégation pour la Doctrine de la Foi, ‘Dix Observations sur la théologie de Gustavo Gutiérrez’, Dialogue No. 925 (22. 3. 1984)Google Scholar.
17 Trenta Giorni for 3. 3. 1984.
18 My analysis appeared in: Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, Briefing 84, Vol. 14, No. 20, for 7. 9. 1984.
19 Congregazione per la dottrina della Fede, ‘Notificazione sul volume Chiesa: Carisma e Potere. Saggio di eccltsiologia militante del padre Leonardo Boff, O. F. M., Osservatore Romano for 20.‐21.3. 1985.
20 Instruction on Christian Freedom and Liberation V. 71. 21H. Cox, The Silencing of Leonardo Boff, op. cit., pp. 146–188. 22
21 It should be noted, however, that as early as 1986 liberation theologian in Latin America were already stressing the importance of political democracy as providing a space where the poor could gain a voice. See McGovern, A. S. J., ‘Liberation Theology is Alive and Well’, Tablet, 15.9. 1990, pp. 1156–1157Google Scholar, and more widely his Liberation Theology and Us Critics (Maryknoll 1989).Google Scholar
23 See P. Higgonet, ‘When Man eats Man’, a review of three studies of revolutionary France, in Times Literary Supplement No 4565, for 28.9.‐4.10. 1990, pp. 1028–1029.
24 G. MacEoin, ‘Latin America turns its back on the faith of its past’Catholic Herald for 5. 10, 1990.
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