Is Liberation Still Central to the Christian Message?

by Joseph Stoutzenberger

During the 1970s, there was much talk of “liberation” among religions, especially Catholicism. Gustavo Gutierrez and other Latin American theologians laid out a biblical and theological foundation for liberation as an essential element of the Christian message. The pope of the time, Pope Paul VI, used the term frequently. In 1976, he wrote: “As the kernel and center of his good news, Christ proclaims salvation, the great gift of God which is liberation from everything that oppresses man.” What is this liberation from oppression that Paul VI was talking about? Is it what Christians mean by “salvation”? Is it still a guiding force in the agenda of the Catholic Church?

I imagine that when most Christians think about “salvation,” they envision that Jesus saves them from eternal damnation and is waiting to welcome them into heavenly peace. On the other hand, “liberation” implies transforming conditions in the world today that are oppressive into ones that foster the well-being of people suffering under oppression. “Jesus saves” means that people experience the love of God in their lives, which fills them with hope for eternal life. “Jesus liberates” means identifying how people are hurting and committing to overcoming conditions that cause suffering. Liberation theologians, along with Pope Paul, had no intention of dismissing personal salvation as central to the good news of Jesus. Gutierrez said that poor people, in particular, hold out hope that life after death will be better for them since they are more likely than others to die before their time and are well-acquainted with suffering in this life. Liberation theology served as a corrective to the “otherworldly” understanding of salvation. Vatican Council II made clear that “painstakingly working for the betterment of the world” went hand in hand with personal spiritual development. In fact, hope in an afterlife of union with God frees people to ask what a young man in the gospels asked of Jesus: What must I do to attain eternal life? Jesus’s reply was: Go and give all that you have to the poor. Jesus did not separate the promise of eternal life from the mandate to care for people who are hurting.
Is liberation still front and center in the message of Catholicism? Early in his papacy, Pope Francis called the church a “field hospital,” dedicated to healing people’s wounds. He had in mind both physical and spiritual wounds. He saw migrants forced to leave their native land as one group whose suffering had multiple causes, from environmental changes to violent conflicts. His first official visit as pope was to a Mediterranean island that serves as a stopping-off point for African migrants seeking refuge in Europe. He saw climate change as an underlying cause of suffering, especially for poor people, and in response, wrote an encyclical on the environment that has led to many Catholic grass-roots organizations addressing the problem. In his most recent encyclical, Fratelli Tutti (2020), Pope Francis appeals to a longstanding Catholic concept, the common good, to call for changing and creating policies and practices aimed at helping people who are hurting. The United States Catholic Bishops continue to talk about the “two feet” of Christian service: individual acts of charity as well as works of justice to bring about social change. The words “liberation” and “oppression” may not be used as frequently as they were fifty years ago, but it is clear that modern Catholic social teaching centered on justice and liberation remains a hallmark of the church’s mission.