Liberation Theology in Latin America: Dead or Alive?

Abstract

This chapter explores the emergence of liberation theology in Latin America in the 1960s and assesses its successes and failures in the next four decades. It emerged from Christian communities, first in Brail and then spread throughout Latin America. This theology is a combination of action and reflection that argues that Christianity should free people rather than oppress them. This action and reflection is based on faith, scripture, tradition, reason and experience. Liberation theology emerged from communities trying to survive in economic, political, ecological, racial and other forms of poverty. I outline the political and economic situations in three Latin American countries where it emerged and coalesced: Brazil, El Salvador and Nicaragua. Brazil is both the richest country but also the one with the largest social gap. It was the locus from where liberation theology emerged and has remained strong. It emerged more slowly in El Salvador and Nicaragua, but played a large role in the political situations. Next, I explore the response of the Roman Catholic Church. By 1990 many in the global North assumed that liberation theology was dead. Socialism and communism were deemed to have failed after the fall of the Berlin Wall as liberationists had often supported socialist economic policies. Furthermore, the Catholic Church condemned liberation theology. However, it is vibrant again in parts of Latin America today. I explore its re-emergence this century. Liberation theology did not die; it moved from its intense focus on the political and economic repression to addressing the wider scope of oppression including issues of race, gender and sexuality among others.