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Stations of the Cross: A Latin American Pilgrimage
In nearly 50 vignettes, the author of such books as The Window of Vulnerablity and Suffering presents her insightful reflections on current events during a recent two-and-a-half-month journey through Latin America. "A clear grasp of our broad social crisis".--Walter Brueggemann, Columbia Theological Seminary.
- GenresTheology
146 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1992
About the author
Dorothee Sölle
99 books47 followersDorothee Steffensky-Sölle was a German liberation theologian and writer.
Sölle studied theology, philosophy and literature at the University of Cologne. She became active in politics, speaking out against the Vietnam War, the arms race of the Cold War and injustices in the developing world. Notably, from 1968 to 1972 she organized Cologne's Politisches Nachtgebet (political night-prayers). Between 1975 and 1987, she spent six months a year at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where she was a professor of systematic theology.
She wrote a large number of books, including Theology for Skeptics: Reflections on God, The Silent Cry: Mysticism and Resistance (2001) and her autobiography Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian (1999). In Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future she coined the term "Christofascist" to describe fundamentalists. Perhaps her best-known work in English was Suffering, which offers a critique of "Christian masochism" and "theological sadism." Sölle's critique is against the assumption that God is all-powerful and the cause of suffering; humans thus suffer for some greater purpose. Instead, God suffers and is powerless alongside us. Humans are to struggle together against oppression, sexism, anti-Semitism, and other forms of authoritarianism.
"I believe in God who created the world has not done such a thing that always must remain, not the ruled by eternal laws, which are immutable, not by natural systems of rich and poor, experts and uninformed, rulers and extradited. I believe in God, who wants the appeal of living and the change in all states through our work, our policy".
Sölle studied theology, philosophy and literature at the University of Cologne. She became active in politics, speaking out against the Vietnam War, the arms race of the Cold War and injustices in the developing world. Notably, from 1968 to 1972 she organized Cologne's Politisches Nachtgebet (political night-prayers). Between 1975 and 1987, she spent six months a year at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where she was a professor of systematic theology.
She wrote a large number of books, including Theology for Skeptics: Reflections on God, The Silent Cry: Mysticism and Resistance (2001) and her autobiography Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian (1999). In Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future she coined the term "Christofascist" to describe fundamentalists. Perhaps her best-known work in English was Suffering, which offers a critique of "Christian masochism" and "theological sadism." Sölle's critique is against the assumption that God is all-powerful and the cause of suffering; humans thus suffer for some greater purpose. Instead, God suffers and is powerless alongside us. Humans are to struggle together against oppression, sexism, anti-Semitism, and other forms of authoritarianism.
"I believe in God who created the world has not done such a thing that always must remain, not the ruled by eternal laws, which are immutable, not by natural systems of rich and poor, experts and uninformed, rulers and extradited. I believe in God, who wants the appeal of living and the change in all states through our work, our policy".
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June 27, 2024
THE GERMAN THEOLOGIAN VISITS AND COMMENTS ON LATIN AMERICA
Dorothee Steffensky-Sölle [Soelle] (1929-2003) was a German liberation theologian who taught systematic theology at Union Theological Seminary from 1975 to 1987. She wrote many books, such as [[ASIN:0800630793 Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian; Thinking About God: An Introduction to Theology; The Strength of the Weak: Toward a Christian Feminist Identity; On Earth as in Heaven: A Liberation Spirituality of Sharing; Celebrating Resistance: The Way of the Cross in Latin America; Political Theology, etc.
She wrote in the Preface to this 1992 book, “There is a second discovery of Latin America… one that analyzes the misery produced by the discoverers… What I am attempting in this book is an ‘other’ discovery of Latin America. Precise definition of the misery is insufficient because it cannot perceive the dignity of the people… On many trips… which took me in two and a half months through seven countries of Latin America, I attempted to make out signs of hope… I tried to discover stories of liberation from the violence which dominates everything. The true story of freedom is a story of freedom from violence in a double sense: of spaces in life which are free of violence and of methods of creating them which are themselves free from violence. Now, months later, I think that it was for the sake of this story that I traveled around… It is a great fortune to experience how the violence which sustains me lives out of the memory of such breaks from the violence ‘of sin and death’ [Rom 8:2].”
She points out, “For most of the poor, the promise of capitalism… has not been realized, though many still dream the dream of individual ascent and private consumption. But often it seems… as if many of the poorest had no understanding of this message because they come out of a completely different culture in which native values of community, common work, and mutual aid are still practiced… they are trying to find a way for the whole slum… to get water so that not only a few lucky individuals will get out of the ghetto of poverty… If anything can be called ‘democratic’ in its goals, its form of organization, and in its nonviolent methods of the weak, it is the base movements---these foretastes of freedom which are smashed again and again.” (Pg. 7-8)
She asks, “Is there any possibility at all of retaining pre-Columbian traditions? The groups and organizations of the indigenous population live on this dream of their own way of life, as do, in a romantic way, many thousands of development workers and alternative tourists. But can it be realized?” (Pg. 26)
She says of the rise of Pentecostal churches in Latin America, “Why do these groups grow so fast? Why do they attract so many of the needy? Why do they reach people whom the base communities of liberation theology have NEVER reached?... The Pentecostal churches are a popular movement, not just a US import… I have heard of people who worked for more than ten years in the base communities for the liberation movement and are now members of Pentecostal churches. They too need community and emotional closeness; they too wait for miracles… the growth of the so-called sects is an expression first of all simply of the increase of impoverishment.” (Pg. 45-46)
She wonders, “Is liberation theology dying? Will it survive?... Is it not discredited by the collapse of state socialism? … I roamed about with these questions and gathered different answers… These very different answers deepened my own thinking in two respects. They warned me against a romantic idealization of the liberation theologians and their work. After a quarter century of the new hermeneutics, weaknesses are more clearly visible. The objective intensification of the poverty in which two-thirds, soon three-quarters, of all people live does not offer any occasion for confidence in progress. The old power of sin and death flattens the resistance, which may be a modest word compared with liberation.” (Pg. 48, 50)
She explains, “A tree consists of roots, trunk, and branches… The trunk of liberation theology is the base communities which keep it alive. The faith of the people of God is reflected by the base communities as it emerges out of their practice, their culture, religion and traditions… The branches of liberation theology are the men and women who work theologically in their meeting places, their journals, their Bible study and prayers… What keeps this theology alive are not the universities but the base movements… The trunk of our tree is diffuse and splintered. There is… no organization of base communities. Groups from the women’s movement, the peace movement, and ecology movement, and the solidarity movement are nevertheless the growing trunk out of which the practice of liberating theology lives, either using or abandoning the old structures. The branches and twigs of First World liberation theology are likewise seldom to be found in theological faculties… the poor are… soon three-fourths on this planet who are impoverished, and non-human creation itself. Their cries demand another theology… And it won’t let itself be silenced.” (Pg. 69)
She observes, “The most important thing I have learned from the poor I recognize in the losing battles in which we are involved here at home… In all these struggles the greatest danger for us lies in becoming tired and giving up… because we submit ourselves to the idol of oppression, who whispers to us with a soft voice: ‘Nothing can be done about it.’ From the poor of Latin America I learn their hope, their toughness, their anger, and their patience. I learn a better theology in which God is not Lore-over-us but Strength-in-us… I belong to them. I am less alone. I begin to hunger and thirst after righteousness.” (Pg. 94-95)
She notes, “hopes spring up in many places: there are information centers for small farmers who are attempting ecological agriculture… But is that enough? Without a change in the export-oriented economy, which is carried out with all technological, political, military and paramilitary force, it seems unthinkable… how many victims will this ‘transition’ yet claim? And when will them demand that societies change their consumer habits and live more simply, so that their victims may simply survive?” (Pg. 128-129)
This book will be of great interest to those studying Liberation Theology, Latin American issues, and other contemporary theological movements.
Dorothee Steffensky-Sölle [Soelle] (1929-2003) was a German liberation theologian who taught systematic theology at Union Theological Seminary from 1975 to 1987. She wrote many books, such as [[ASIN:0800630793 Against the Wind: Memoir of a Radical Christian; Thinking About God: An Introduction to Theology; The Strength of the Weak: Toward a Christian Feminist Identity; On Earth as in Heaven: A Liberation Spirituality of Sharing; Celebrating Resistance: The Way of the Cross in Latin America; Political Theology, etc.
She wrote in the Preface to this 1992 book, “There is a second discovery of Latin America… one that analyzes the misery produced by the discoverers… What I am attempting in this book is an ‘other’ discovery of Latin America. Precise definition of the misery is insufficient because it cannot perceive the dignity of the people… On many trips… which took me in two and a half months through seven countries of Latin America, I attempted to make out signs of hope… I tried to discover stories of liberation from the violence which dominates everything. The true story of freedom is a story of freedom from violence in a double sense: of spaces in life which are free of violence and of methods of creating them which are themselves free from violence. Now, months later, I think that it was for the sake of this story that I traveled around… It is a great fortune to experience how the violence which sustains me lives out of the memory of such breaks from the violence ‘of sin and death’ [Rom 8:2].”
She points out, “For most of the poor, the promise of capitalism… has not been realized, though many still dream the dream of individual ascent and private consumption. But often it seems… as if many of the poorest had no understanding of this message because they come out of a completely different culture in which native values of community, common work, and mutual aid are still practiced… they are trying to find a way for the whole slum… to get water so that not only a few lucky individuals will get out of the ghetto of poverty… If anything can be called ‘democratic’ in its goals, its form of organization, and in its nonviolent methods of the weak, it is the base movements---these foretastes of freedom which are smashed again and again.” (Pg. 7-8)
She asks, “Is there any possibility at all of retaining pre-Columbian traditions? The groups and organizations of the indigenous population live on this dream of their own way of life, as do, in a romantic way, many thousands of development workers and alternative tourists. But can it be realized?” (Pg. 26)
She says of the rise of Pentecostal churches in Latin America, “Why do these groups grow so fast? Why do they attract so many of the needy? Why do they reach people whom the base communities of liberation theology have NEVER reached?... The Pentecostal churches are a popular movement, not just a US import… I have heard of people who worked for more than ten years in the base communities for the liberation movement and are now members of Pentecostal churches. They too need community and emotional closeness; they too wait for miracles… the growth of the so-called sects is an expression first of all simply of the increase of impoverishment.” (Pg. 45-46)
She wonders, “Is liberation theology dying? Will it survive?... Is it not discredited by the collapse of state socialism? … I roamed about with these questions and gathered different answers… These very different answers deepened my own thinking in two respects. They warned me against a romantic idealization of the liberation theologians and their work. After a quarter century of the new hermeneutics, weaknesses are more clearly visible. The objective intensification of the poverty in which two-thirds, soon three-quarters, of all people live does not offer any occasion for confidence in progress. The old power of sin and death flattens the resistance, which may be a modest word compared with liberation.” (Pg. 48, 50)
She explains, “A tree consists of roots, trunk, and branches… The trunk of liberation theology is the base communities which keep it alive. The faith of the people of God is reflected by the base communities as it emerges out of their practice, their culture, religion and traditions… The branches of liberation theology are the men and women who work theologically in their meeting places, their journals, their Bible study and prayers… What keeps this theology alive are not the universities but the base movements… The trunk of our tree is diffuse and splintered. There is… no organization of base communities. Groups from the women’s movement, the peace movement, and ecology movement, and the solidarity movement are nevertheless the growing trunk out of which the practice of liberating theology lives, either using or abandoning the old structures. The branches and twigs of First World liberation theology are likewise seldom to be found in theological faculties… the poor are… soon three-fourths on this planet who are impoverished, and non-human creation itself. Their cries demand another theology… And it won’t let itself be silenced.” (Pg. 69)
She observes, “The most important thing I have learned from the poor I recognize in the losing battles in which we are involved here at home… In all these struggles the greatest danger for us lies in becoming tired and giving up… because we submit ourselves to the idol of oppression, who whispers to us with a soft voice: ‘Nothing can be done about it.’ From the poor of Latin America I learn their hope, their toughness, their anger, and their patience. I learn a better theology in which God is not Lore-over-us but Strength-in-us… I belong to them. I am less alone. I begin to hunger and thirst after righteousness.” (Pg. 94-95)
She notes, “hopes spring up in many places: there are information centers for small farmers who are attempting ecological agriculture… But is that enough? Without a change in the export-oriented economy, which is carried out with all technological, political, military and paramilitary force, it seems unthinkable… how many victims will this ‘transition’ yet claim? And when will them demand that societies change their consumer habits and live more simply, so that their victims may simply survive?” (Pg. 128-129)
This book will be of great interest to those studying Liberation Theology, Latin American issues, and other contemporary theological movements.
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