Gustavo Gutierrez OP, the ‘father of liberation theology’, has just celebrated his 90th birthday. The orthodoxy of the Peruvian Dominican was doubted by many in the ecclesiastical establishment. But times change. Pope Francis sent him birthday greetings: 

“Thank you for your efforts and for your way of challenging everyone’s conscience, so that no one remains indifferent to the tragedy of poverty and exclusion.”

The Pope also thanked Gutierrez for his contribution “to the Church and humanity through your theological service and your preferential love for the poor and discarded of society”.

When I was studying theology in the 1970s, Gutierrez’s book The Theology of Liberation was very popular. I still treasure the first British edition which was published in 1974.

The theology of liberation presents a paradigm shift from traditional theology. The message of the Gospel, in this theology, is located in the here and now. It is a gospel with a lot of concrete social implications. Besides, it gives the poor a central role in its proclamation. In the theology of Father Gutierrez, Christ has been squarely positioned against the social structures that perpetuate poverty.

One can image how happy I was when some 15 years ago I met him thanks to the invite of Discern, the Curia’s research institute. I loved listening to his lectures and I treasured my one-to-one conversations with him.

This theological giant, who is the champion of the poor, takes the guise of a man of small stature. Many, however, have considered him to be a dangerous man with a pernicious message. I was surprised when he told me over a cup of coffee that his theology was considered to be so dangerous that in 1987 the armies of North and Latin America held a conference whose subject was Liberation Theology.

I challenged Gutierrez with one of the most common arguments against liberation theology. Yours is a Marxist-inspired theology, I objected, and Marxism is anti-Christian.

God loves everyone but he loves the poor most because they need more love since they are the weakest

“If one uses some of the categories of Freud does it mean that one also adopts the atheism of Freud?” he answers back. “Marxism looks at Christianity as alienation, we look at it as salvation. Are we Marxists?” The argument ends with a knock out.

I fired a second salvo that was commonly used to rubbish Gutierrez. “Liberation Theology fosters violence which is definitely against the Gospel message.”

“I, and the other main exponents of this theology such as Sobrino and Boff, have never advocated violence. Remember that the term liberation theology is not our private property. If someone advocated violence in the name of what he prefers to call liberation theology what can we do against this abuse? Have not many perpetrated abuses in the name of Christianity.” End of argument? This time it’s not. He continues. “But remember that poverty is the first violence.”

His antidote to this type of violence was the preferential option for the poor. This was probably the cornerstone of his theology.

“When we say the preferential option for the poor we are only using contemporary jargon to describe a biblical reality. Preference is not exclusion. God loves everyone but he loves the poor most because they need more love since they are the weakest.”

Gutierrez’s sociological and political analysis turns into a theology based on God’s gratuitous love. “The preferential option of the poor means a commitment to live in solidarity with the poor … We are not with the poor if we are not against poverty.”

He passionately speaks about poverty and the many ways men and women are destroyed by it. Brought up in a poor family, Gutierrez learned the hard way that poverty is a killer, and that its victims are the vast majority of the people of this world. The poor are affected at different stages of their lives, even its very beginning, by cultural death as well as by physical death. Many are destined to a life of poverty from the beginning of their lives as a result of the colour of their skin or their gender. Many die physically, many times a very slow death, because of the material poverty that enslaves them.

I was positively impressed that while proposing this struggle against the structures that perpetuate poverty Fr Gutierrez does not behave like some fire and brimstone prophet. Understanding more than rabid denouncing is his style.  When I asked him for his opinion of Europeans’ treatment of the poor, he replied: “The Europeans – both the governments and the people – seem to have less and less time for the poor.” But he does not continue his line of argument by uttering a strong condemnation. “Perhaps they are tired of listening about poverty. They are tired of giving.”

Together with Pope Francis I pray that Fr Gutierrez continues giving witness to the joy of the Gospel.

joseph.borg@um.edu.mt