Texts on Liberation Theology

[BIXX]

I am not religious but I feel liberation theology could become useful to me (my aunt and her missionary friends). Basically are there any texts/videos/general resources I should read?

Thank you for your time.

[Sabot Cat]

I too have been interested in Liberation Theology, and I've found this site to be a good landing point for one's studies on it: http://liberationtheology.org/articles/

[Prometeo liberado]

I think that the Catholic Worker website has stuff you may find interesting considering that L.T. is their get down.

[TiberiusGracchus]

You should also check out friar Herbert McCabe (O.P), he was not a liberation theologican per se, he was too much of an orthodox catholic for that, and a highly respected theologian in the tradition of st. Thomas Aquinas.

However:

Gregarious and with a fondness for drinking, McCabe was known to sing IRA songs at the Greyhound pub in Oxford, and to teach guests at Blackfriars the Italian Communist song Avanti Popolo, with a chorus of "Mussolini e un bastardo!". A friend recalled him proudly offering, in the course of an evening at the Polish Hearth Club in London, to assassinate Pope John Paul II, stating this as the duty of a good Catholic. :grin:


I can recommend you all of his work, but in particular "God Matters", a book about all kinds of catholic theological stuff but it also includes chapters on Class Struggle and Hunger Strikes. McCabe argues from a theological standpoint that it's every christian's duty to participate in the class struggle on the side of the proletariat, and that "in the end, the workers will need not only solidarity and class consciousness, but guns as well".

[blake 3:17]

Worth reading up Ernesto Cardenal: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/ernesto-cardenal

Michael Lowy's War of the Gods is pretty good as I remember.

[hatzel]

I know it's not exactly liberation theology, but Jesus Radicals (http://www.jesusradicals.com/) has some decent stuff; the sheer number of texts in the Jacques Ellul (http://www.jesusradicals.com/theology/jacques-ellul/) section, for example, is staggering!

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

The works of Hamid Dabashi and Ali Shariati are pretty interesting.

[Illegalitarian]

Pope Francis was a supporter of LT back in the day, something he's probably trying to keep a lid on now that he's the big cheese.

I have no real issues with it, but unfortunately I have no texts on it either

[Ocean Seal]

A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics, and Salvation
by the founder of LT: Gustavo Gutierrez
Go with staple texts on it, and you'll learn quite a bit and be able to dispense advice. I really think we should make a study group on this on revleft, even as an ex-Catholic these texts are very powerful.

[Red Commissar]

Pope Francis was a supporter of LT back in the day, something he's probably trying to keep a lid on now that he's the big cheese.


He was? From what I can understand he was pretty accommodating to the military government of Argentina. If he had supported it I think it was only certain aspects and definitely not something he made public, even before he was Pope. There've have been interpretations that he was hostile to LT beyond just working with the Argentine authorities.

[Huey Prashker]

If you're interested in the other direction, Alistar Kee has books about Liberation Theology in South America and Black Liberation Theology. I also read and liked James Hal Cone's first book. (liked in the sense that it was cool, motivating, and had some great criticisms of oppressive theology, not liked in the sense that I'm now religious or think any form of theology is a good revolutionary agent)

[Illegalitarian]

Several of his associates have said over the years that it wasn't something he spoke on often, but he did support the idea, yes