This book explores the ideals of liberation theology from the perspectives of major religious traditions, including Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and the neo-Vedanta and Advaita Hindu traditions. The goal of this volume is not to explain the Christian liberation theology tradition and then assess whether the non-Christian liberation theologies meet the Christian standards. Rather, authors use comparative/interreligious methodologies to offer new insights on liberation theology and begin a dialogue on how to build interreligious liberation theologies. The goal is to make liberation theology more inclusive of religious diversity beyond traditional Christian categories.

Theology, according to liberation theologians is only a second step. The first is praxis. A liberating praxis puts the poor and the marginalised at the centre. It is found in the collective response of global religious communities responding to crises – and a global pandemic offers an important case in point, reminding religions of our shared humanity, and the need for interreligious cooperation and understanding to effect a positive response. In the context of seismic socio-economic and political change, religion provides a communal response for feeding the poor, fighting for their rights, and challenging the post-colonial financial model that is now beginning to lose its ground. This book blends an examination of emerging research on the socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in marginalised communities, with the author’s own research on social and poverty isolation in India, and his own experience as told in diaries written whilst in lockdown in a poor district of Santiago, Chile. It challenges majority world churches and religions in a post-pandemic world to learn from each other and from Jesus’ own identification with the outcast, and urges them to take on a way of life and prophetic learning from the world of the poor.

In this frank and honest work, one of the pioneers of liberation theology in Latin America reassesses the movement in light of post-Cold War realities. Comblin outlines a liberative, theological pastoral agenda for now and the decades to come in the face of massive urbanization and the apparent triumph of the global marketplace. With the increasing apartheid of rich and poor, the cause of liberation remains as urgent as ever-perhaps more so. Jose Comblin, already established as a premier contributor to liberation theology, has now provided a work of major new importance. Significant changes have occurred since the inception of liberation theology thirty years ago, and Comblin provides a remarkably comprehensive, critical, and insightful study of economic, political, cultural, and religious developments that liberation theology must address. He offers as well a challenging new theological emphasis on 'freedom.' -Arthur F. McGovern, SJ University of Detroit A 'must read' for all interested in current debates among Latin American liberation theologians, and more broadly, on the eve of the third millennium, for all wondering about the meaning of the good news of the coming of God's reign in history. -Lee Cormie St. Michael's College and the Toronto School of Theology He dispels the rumor that liberation theology is disappearing or dead. This book is about the future of liberation theology, and, if Jose Comblin is right, it will play a vital role in the coming century. -Curt Cadorette University of Rochester

Liberation theologies are the most important theological movement of our time. In the 20th century, their influence shook the Third and First Worlds, grass root organizations and the affluent Western academy, as well as the lives of priests and laypeople persecuted and murdered for living out their understanding of the Christian message. In the 21st C their insights and goals remain – unfortunately – as valid as ever.

Liberation Theology is the first serious acknowledgment by a white theologian of the challenge of Black Theology. It invites American theology to reconsider radically its foundations and to reorder its priorities. At a time when theology is often presented piecemeal, Frederick Herzog undertakes to ground Liberation Theology in the originating events of the Christian faith as a whole - in this instance, in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ as given in the Fourth Gospel. The systematic readings in the Gospel which he makes and from which emerge the principles of Liberation Theology are the heart of this book. Throughout, the author asks: How do we understand Christ as Liberator? The answer to this question, he maintains, determines whether or not we are still able to contemplate the Word as power and action. Written with contemporary directness and free of vague abstractions, the book casts theology into a new form to meet today's needs. The method of this new theology is confrontation, not correlation; its goal is liberation, not reformation; and it strives for a new space of freedom among people captive to the dehumanizing structures of modern theology.

Theology, according to liberation theologians is only a second step. The first is praxis. A liberating praxis puts the poor and the marginalised at the centre. It is found in the collective response of global religious communities responding to crises – and a global pandemic offers an important case in point, reminding religions of our shared humanity, and the need for interreligious cooperation and understanding to effect a positive response. In the context of seismic socio-economic and political change, religion provides a communal response for feeding the poor, fighting for their rights, and challenging the post-colonial financial model that is now beginning to lose its ground. This book blends an examination of emerging research on the socio-economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in marginalised communities, with the author’s own research on social and poverty isolation in India, and his own experience as told in diaries written whilst in lockdown in a poor district of Santiago, Chile. It challenges majority world churches and religions in a post-pandemic world to learn from each other and from Jesus’ own identification with the outcast, and urges them to take on a way of life and prophetic learning from the world of the poor.

An Alternative Vision: An Interpretation of Liberation Theology offers a complete overview of the liberation theology movement that is ideally suited for a thorough study of the major questions and important theologians that have contributed to the debate. It outlines and brings together into a single unified account liberation theology's alternate vision for providing the possibility of meaningful historical existence for humans in the world today. The author translates the Christian vision of liberation theologians from Latin America into more general theological and cultural categories familiar to the English-speaking world, then shows how that vision makes a unified interpretation of Christian doctrine. First, liberation theology must be seen as a response to massive human suffering witnessed throughout the world today. This human agony is largely caused by human beings and the social and political structures we create, and liberation theology addresses this dilemma using the tradition of Christian wisdom and direct imperatives that have universal, transcultural significance. The second goal is achieved by showing the connection between liberation principles and the major doctrines of Christian belief, including God, Jesus Christ, faith, grace, the church, sacraments, ministry, and spirituality.