...chances are, i am.
this week in church history we learned about two very important people in the area of church history who were not theologians: charles darwin and karl marx. i'm actually quite a fan of both, but for this week's purposes, karl marx is my man. other important information: in the theology of martin luther king, jr., we have created colloquys (basically just means groups to present to the class on a specific topic) and the topic my group within the colloquy has is a comparison of mlk's theology to liberation theology. needless to say, it's not really feasible to talk about liberation theology without talking about latin american liberation theology, which is arguably the the "original" liberation theology (though some people were in the process of developing different forms of liberation theology at the same time, though the different groups were mutually unaware of each other). this has allowed me to dig back into my liberation theology books from undergrad, which has been great.
anyway, karl marx. even before dr. hendel stated in class that karl marx greatly influenced liberation theology, i had been thinking about that as i read for my mlk class. communism and socialism are very similar (and oftentimes used interchangeably), though marx would probably argue that socialism is just a stepping stone to communism. i tend to locate myself in more of a socialism camp than a communist camp (probably due to the connection in my head between communism and the ussr) and many times i feel like jesus is there (perhaps because in gospels like mark jesus works within the system - healing, but still having people do the ritual things that need doing to be declared clean by the temple). that's a bit off-topic, but i do think that karl marx provides an interesting lens to actually, openmindedly think about christianity and jesus.
karl marx's communist theory affirms the idea that human history curves to a place of justice. this is very clearly articulated in mlk's famous quote, "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice" (found in "where do we go from here?"), and liberation theology holds to the belief that not only does it bend towards justice, but that god is bending it towards justice. as marx articulated the need for understanding societal change with respect to material and economic goods, so too does latin american liberation theology very clearly state that god makes an "option for the poor" (Introducing Liberation Theology, Boff & Boff, p. 44-45). it is the socioeconomic poor who are the source of liberation theology and those who are not socioeconomically poor are called to struggle with those who are and to stand in solidarity with them.
while marx was very intelligent and had really good ideas (and i could go on about the similarities of liberation theology and marxist communism), the one thing that karl marx lacked is god. for him, religion was simply the "opiate of the masses." this has been true for far too long. liberation theologies come in as they reclaim the church's role as a prophetic voice rather than a pacifying voice. as god cries out, the church is called to cry out against injustice. that is what the role of religion should be. so, on second thought, perhaps karl marx was right about religion. lately it seems to be the opiate of the masses, but when will it use its power to teach people how to behave (as marx put it) to teach people to act in a way that lines up with god's will for creation? perhaps instead of demonizing communism, we should consider its critique of religion and what it might mean to get back to our roots, to follow jesus into the margins, and to do theology by doing liberation.
No comments:
Post a Comment