FREE FROM SIN
SOMETHING of the qualified nature of the Vatican's latest criticism of liberation theology may be gathered from press reactions to it. 'Vatican urges passive resistance,' said the Times. The Telegraph Was more cautious: 'Vatican document appears to back "freedorii fighters".' Take Your pick. It is certainly true that in section 79 the document allows 'armed struggle' against prolonged tyranny -- a principle that was old when Thomas Aquinas formu- lated it in the 13th century. Only because the 'technology of violence' is so much more developed and dangerous today does the Vatican recommend passive resistance as preferable. But the point which will enrage hardened liberation theologians has nothing directly to do with armed struggle. It is the Vatican's refusal to admit the validity of 'orthopraxis' — the idea that Principles for action should be constructed from the experience of the poor — that annoys them, if the reaction of the BBC's Brazilian service is anything to go by. The Catholic Church still chooses to stand by traditional standards of objective morality imposed from above: orthodoxy. The nearest the Vatican comes to orthopraxis leaves no room for Marxist methodology. The poor, it says, sharing in the sensus fidei of the Church, do indeed understand best what the most radical liberation is: not from oppressive governments but from sin.
Previous page
