Liberation theology is a

Christian theological Christian theology is the theology of Christian belief and practice. Such study concentrates primarily upon the texts of the Old Testament and of the New Testament, as well as on Christian tradition. Christian theologians use biblical exegesis, ...

approach emphasizing the liberation of the oppressed. In certain contexts, it engages

socio-economic Socioeconomics (also known as social economics) is the social science that studies how economic activity affects and is shaped by social processes. In general it analyzes how modern societies progress, stagnate, or regress because of their local ...

analyses, with "social concern for the poor and political liberation for oppressed peoples". In other contexts, it addresses other forms of inequality, such as race or caste. Liberation theology is best known in the

Latin America Latin America or * french: Amérique Latine, link=no * ht, Amerik Latin, link=no * pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...

n context, especially within Catholicism in the 1960s after the

Second Vatican Council The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the , or , was the 21st ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church. The council met in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome for four periods (or sessions), each lasting between 8 and ...

, where it became the political

praxis Praxis may refer to: Philosophy and religion * Praxis (process), the process by which a theory, lesson, or skill is enacted, practised, embodied, or realised * Praxis model, a way of doing theology * Praxis (Byzantine Rite), the practice of fai ...

of theologians such as

Gustavo Gutiérrez Gustavo Gutiérrez Merino (born 8 June 1928) is a Peruvian philosopher, Catholic theologian, and Dominican priest, regarded as one of the founders of Latin American liberation theology. He currently holds the John Cardinal O'Hara Professo ...

, Leonardo Boff, and

Jesuits , image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders = ...

Juan Luis Segundo Juan Luis Segundo (March 31, 1925, in Montevideo, Uruguay – January 17, 1996, in Montevideo) was a Jesuit priest and Uruguayan theologian who was an important figure in the movement known as Latin American liberation theology. He wrote numero ...

and

Jon Sobrino Jon Sobrino (born 1938) is a Jesuit Catholic priest and theologian, known mostly for his contributions to Latin American liberation theology. He received worldwide attention in 2007 when the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith i ...

, who popularized the phrase "

preferential option for the poor The option for the poor, or the preferential option for the poor, is one of the newer principles of the Catholic social teaching, as articulated in the latter half of the 20th century; it is also a theological emphasis in Methodism. The concept ...

". This expression was used first by Jesuit Fr. General

Pedro Arrupe Pedro Arrupe Gondra, SJ (14 November 1907 – 5 February 1991) was a Spanish Basque priest who served as the 28th Superior General of the Society of Jesus from 1965 to 1983. He has been called a second founder of the Society, as he led the Jesui ...

in 1968 and soon after the World Synod of Catholic Bishops in 1971 chose as its theme "Justice in the World". The Latin American context also produced Protestant advocates of liberation theology, such as

Rubem Alves Rubem Azevedo Alves (15 September 1933 – 19 July 2014) was a Brazilian theologian, philosopher, educator, writer and psychoanalyst. Alves was one of the founders of Latin American liberation theology. Life Alves was born on September 15, 1933, ...

José Míguez Bonino José Míguez Bonino ( Rosario, Santa Fe, 5 March 1924 – Tandil, 1 July 2012) was an Argentine Methodist theologian. Biography Bonino was raised in the Methodist Church, and participated actively in this denomination since his youth. He st ...

, and C. René Padilla, who in the 1970s called for

integral mission Integral mission or holistic mission describes an understanding of Christian mission that embraces both evangelism and social responsibility. With origins in Latin American, integral mission has influenced a significant number of Protestants aroun ...

, emphasizing evangelism and

social responsibility Social responsibility is an ethical framework in which an individual is obligated to work and cooperate with other individuals and organizations for the benefit of the community that will inherit the world that individual leaves behind. Social ...

. Theologies of liberation have also developed in other parts of the world such as black theology in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

Palestinian liberation theology Christian political theology in the Middle East is a religious response by Christian leaders and scholars to political problems. Political theologians try to balance the demands of a tumultuous region with the delicate but long history of Christia ...

Dalit theology Dalit theology is a branch of Christian theology that emerged among the Dalit caste in the Indian subcontinent in the 1980s. It shares a number of themes with Latin American liberation theology, which arose two decades earlier, including a self- ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, and

Minjung theology Minjung theology () emerged in the 1970s from the experience of South Korean Christians in the struggle for social justice. It is a people's theology, and, according to its authors, "a development of the political hermeneutics of the Gospel in ter ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...

Latin American liberation theology

The best-known form of liberation theology is that which developed within the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

in the 1960s, arising principally as a moral reaction to the poverty and

social injustice Social justice is justice in terms of the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has often referred to the process of ensuring that individuals f ...

in the region, which Cepal, a leftist think tank, deemed the most unequal in the world. The term was coined in 1971 by the

Peruvian Peruvians ( es, peruanos) are the citizens of Peru. There were Andean and coastal ancient civilizations like Caral, which inhabited what is now Peruvian territory for several millennia before the Spanish conquest of Peru, Spanish conquest in th ...

priest

, who wrote one of the movement's defining books, '' A Theology of Liberation''. Other noted exponents include Leonardo Boff of Brazil, and Jesuits

of El Salvador and

of Uruguay. Latin American liberation theology influenced parts of the

evangelical movement Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide interdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being "born again", in which an individual exper ...

and Catholic bishops in the United States. Its purported use of " Marxist concepts" led in the mid-1980s to an admonition by the

Vatican Vatican may refer to: Vatican City, the city-state ruled by the pope in Rome, including St. Peter's Basilica, Sistine Chapel, Vatican Museum The Holy See * The Holy See, the governing body of the Catholic Church and sovereign entity recognized ...

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) is the oldest among the departments of the Roman Curia. Its seat is the Palace of the Holy Office in Rome. It was founded to defend the Catholic Church from heresy and is the body responsible ...

(CDF). While stating that "in itself, the expression 'theology of liberation' is a thoroughly valid term", the prefect Cardinal Ratzinger rejected certain forms of Latin American liberation theology for focusing on institutionalized or systemic sin and for identifying Catholic Church hierarchy in South America as members of the same privileged class that had long been oppressing indigenous populations from the arrival of Pizarro onward.Wojda, Paul J., "Liberation theology," in R.P. McBrien, ed., ''The Catholic Encyclopedia'' (Harper Collins, 1995).

Black theology

More or less at the same time as the initial publications of Latin American liberation theology are also found voices of Black liberation theology and feminist liberation theology. Black theology refers to a theological perspective which originated in some

black church The black church (sometimes termed Black Christianity or African American Christianity) is the faith and body of Christian congregations and denominations in the United States that minister predominantly to African Americans, as well as their ...

es in the

and later in other parts of the world, which contextualizes

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...

in an attempt to help those of African descent overcome oppression. It especially focuses on the

injustice Injustice is a quality relating to unfairness or undeserved outcomes. The term may be applied in reference to a particular event or situation, or to a larger status quo. In Western philosophy and jurisprudence, injustice is very commonly—but n ...

s committed against

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

s and black

South Africans The population of South Africa is about 58.8 million people of diverse origins, cultures, languages, and religions. The South African National Census of 2022 was the most recent census held; the next will be in 2032. In 2011, Statistics South ...

during American segregation and

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

, respectively. Black theology seeks to liberate people of colour from multiple forms of political, social, economic, and religious subjugation and views Christian theology as a theology of liberation – "a rational study of the being of God in the world in light of the existential situation of an oppressed community, relating the forces of liberation to the essence of the Gospel, which is Jesus Christ," writes

James Hal Cone James Hal Cone (August 5, 1938 – April 28, 2018) was an American theologian, best known for his advocacy of black theology and black liberation theology. His 1969 book ''Black Theology and Black Power'' provided a new way to comprehensively de ...

, one of the original advocates of the perspective. Black theology mixes Christianity with questions of

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life o ...

, particularly as raised by the Black Power movement and the

Black Consciousness Movement The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was a grassroots anti-Apartheid activist movement that emerged in South Africa in the mid-1960s out of the political vacuum created by the jailing and banning of the African National Congress and Pan Afri ...

Dalit theology

Dalit theology is a branch of Christian

theology Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

that emerged among the

Dalit Dalit (from sa, दलित, dalita meaning "broken/scattered"), also previously known as untouchable, is the lowest stratum of the castes in India. Dalits were excluded from the four-fold varna system of Hinduism and were seen as forming ...

caste in the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...

in the 1980s. It shares a number of themes with

Latin American liberation theology Latin American liberation theology (, ) is a synthesis of Christian theology and Marxian socio-economic analyses, that emphasizes "social concern for the poor and political liberation for oppressed peoples". Beginning in the 1960s after the Se ...

, which arose two decades earlier, including a self-identity as a people undergoing

Exodus Exodus or the Exodus may refer to: Religion * Book of Exodus, second book of the Hebrew Torah and the Christian Bible * The Exodus, the biblical story of the migration of the ancient Israelites from Egypt into Canaan Historical events * Ex ...

. Dalit theology sees hope in the "Nazareth Manifesto" of Luke 4, where

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...

speaks of preaching "good news to the poor ... freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind" and of releasing "the oppressed".

Palestinian liberation theology

Palestinian liberation theology is an expression of political theology and a contextual theology that represents an attempt by a number of independently working Palestinian theologians from various denominations—mostly

Protestant Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...

mainline churches—to articulate the gospel message in such a way as to make that liberating gospel relevant to the perceived needs of their indigenous flocks. As a rule, this articulation involves a condemnation of the State of

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, a theological underpinning of Palestinian resistance to Israel as well as Palestinian national aspirations, and an intense valorization of Palestinian ethnic and cultural identity as guarantors of a truer grasp of the gospel by virtue of the fact that they are inhabitants of the land of Jesus and the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...

. The principal figure in Palestinian liberation theology is the Anglican cleric Naim Ateek, founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

References

External links

Liberation Theology Video
from th
Dean Peter Krogh Foreign Affairs Digital Archives

* ttp://lagunadeapoyo.blogspot.com/2014/08/papal-suspension-against-miguel-descoto.html Papal suspension against Miguel d'Escoto is lifted
Key Concepts of Revolution Theology
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On Pope John Paul II's relationship to Liberation theology

BBC Religion and Ethics theological obituary of Pope John Paul II: his views on liberation theology

Latin American Catholics’ problem with Pope John Paul II
Seattle Times. Henry Chu and Chris Kraul. {{Use British English Oxford spelling, date=November 2017 Catholicism and far-left politics Christian socialism Christian terminology Christian theological movements Christianity and politics Economic progressivism Marxism Religious activism World Christianity