A Brief History of Theosemiotic

Theosemiotic ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 15-42
Author(s):  
Michael L. Raposa

This chapter supplies a historical survey of theosemiotic, focused less on demonstrating actual lines of causal influence than on exposing the resonance of certain ideas articulated by thinkers sometimes far removed from each other in space and time. It links Peirce’s thought to that of earlier figures (like Augustine, Duns Scotus, John Poinsot, Jonathan Edwards, and Ralph Waldo Emerson), certain contemporaries (especially William James and Josiah Royce), and later thinkers and developments (most notably, H. Richard Niebuhr, Simone Weil, and Gustavo Gutierrez). The chapter begins with an examination of the religious significance of talk about the “book of nature” and concludes with the observation of a certain natural affinity between a theosemiotic inspired by Peirce’s pragmatism and Latin American liberation theology.

Author(s):  
Ole Jakob Løland

AbstractThe battle for meaning and influence between Latin American liberations theologians and the Vatican was one of the most significant conflicts in the global Catholic church of the twentieth century. With the election of the Argentinean Jorge Mario Bergoglio as head of the global church in 2013, the question about the legacy of liberation theology was actualized. The canonization of Archbishop Oscar Romero and the pope’s approximation to the public figure of Gustavo Gutiérrez signaled a new approach to the liberation theology movement in the Vatican. This article argues that Pope Francis shares some of the main theological concerns as pontiff with liberation theology. Although the pope remains an outsider to liberation theology, he has in a sense solved the conflict between the Vatican and the Latin American social movement. Through an analysis of ecclesial documents and theological literature, his can be discerned on three levels. First, Pope Francis’ use of certain theological ideas from liberation theology has been made possible and less controversial by post-cold war contexts. Second, Pope Francis has contributed to the solution of this conflict through significant symbolic gestures rather than through a shift of official positions. Third, as Pope Francis, the Argentinian Jorge Mario Bergoglio has appropriated certain elements that are specific to liberation theology without acknowledging his intellectual debt to it.


2004 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 676-676
Author(s):  
Ryan D. Tweney ◽  
Amy B. Wachholtz

Wegner's The Illusion of Conscious Will (2002) ignores an important aspect of the history of the concept: the determinism of Jonathan Edwards (1754) and the later response to this determinism by William James and others. We argue that Edwards's formulation, and James's resolution of the resulting dilemma, are superior to Wegner's.


Author(s):  
Roberto Goizueta

The term ‘theologies of liberation’ refers to a global theological movement that emerged in the 1950s and 1960s among Christians working for justice among the poor of the Third World. Most systematically articulated, initially, by Latin American theologians such as the Peruvian priest Gustavo Gutiérrez, liberation theology is rooted in the Gospel claim that Jesus Christ is identified in a special way with the poor and marginalized of our world. Early influences on the emergence of liberation theology in Latin America included: the Catholic Action movement, base ecclesial communities, Vatican II (especially Gaudium et spes), and the Medellín Conference of 1968. The central insight of liberation theologies is that, because God makes a ‘preferential option for the poor’, we are called to do so as well; if Christ is identified with the marginalized, the lives of the poor is the privileged locus for practising Christian theological reflection.


Horizons ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-95
Author(s):  
Todd Walatka

Vatican II'sGaudium et Spes(GS) has had an unmistakable and demonstrable impact on Latin American liberation theology. Likewise, any sufficient account of the impact of GS on the wider church would need to attend to liberation theology. This article affirms this basic point, then explores the often-underappreciated relationship between liberation theology andLumen Gentium(LG).In particular, it investigates how Gustavo Gutiérrez and Jon Sobrino interpret a fundamental ecclesiological affirmation of LG: the church as a sacrament of salvation and unity. Gutiérrez's early work provides, and Sobrino deepens, the basic point that the church's work as a sacrament inherently demands an option for the poor. Rather than being simply part of its social teaching, this option is at the heart of the churchquachurch. It is essential both for an adequate interpretation of LG and for a church seeking to be a credible sign and effective instrument of salvation and unity in the world.


Imbizo ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-109
Author(s):  
Hazel Tafadzwa Ngoshi

 Autobiographical subjects are products of their experiential histories, memories, agency and the discourses of their time lived and time of textual production. This article explores the religious and political discursive economy in which Abel Muzorewa (former Prime Minister of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia) narrates the story of his life and how this discursive context constructs his autobiographical subjectivity. The article examines how Muzorewa’s religious beliefs – com­bined with his experiential history of being a colonial subject – are deployed as a strategy of constructing his subjectivity. I argue that the discursive contexts of mass nationalism and his Christian religious beliefs grounded in Latin American liberation theology construct both Mu­zorewa as the subject of Rise up and walk and the narrative discourse. The article posits that the narrative tropes derived from Christian texts that Muzorewa deploys mediate his identity, and that his selfhood emerges with the unfolding of the narrative. What he claims to be politi­cal pragmatism on his part is also inspired by the practical theology which he subscribes to. I argue that his subjectivity is complexly realised through the contradictory relationship between missionary theology and liberation theology.


Author(s):  
А. Denisenko

The subject of the new kind of theology which arose in 1960’s and 1970’s been and still is much disputed issue. Here I mean liberation theology and the most influential book in this particular kind of theology, A Theology of Liberation by Gustavo Gutierrez. Time clamed this book as "The movement's most influential text.This book is a classical historical and theological study. It represents the new fresh wind in the history of theological study.


Author(s):  
Mario I. Aguilar

This chapter identifies theologies of sacraments in the context of liberation theology, rooted primarily in work among poor Christians in 1960s Latin America. In doing so it addresses the “first step” (“the experience of God through the poor and the marginalized”) and the “second step” (“the historical and theological developments that led to the beginnings of liberation theology as a reflection on Christian experience”). The seminal work in liberation theology developed by Gustavo Gutiérrez and Juan Luis Segundo is described, as is the impact of the 1968 Latin American Bishops Conference in Medellin. In addition, the work of Ernesto Cardenal, a Nicaraguan Catholic priest, poet, and politician, in viewing the Eucharist in connection to the prophetic work of Jesus Christ among the poor is examined—specifically in the context of celebrating Eucharist in the Nicaraguan peasant communities of the archipelago of Solentiname.


Author(s):  
Heber Carlos de Campos

This chapter gives an overview of the reception of Jonathan Edwards in Latin America, particularly Brazil. In Brazil, Evangelicals and Pentecostals have especially appropriated Edwards. At first, Edwards was received as a revivalist. Protestant Christians in Brazil in the mid-twentieth century were enamoured with church growth, pietistic spirituality, and revivalism. Biographies of Edwards and his writings on these subjects (especially as they related to the First Great Awakening) were translated into Portuguese and Spanish, serving to introduce Christians to Edwards’s life and thought. More recently, Protestant Christians have begun to appreciate Edwards’s Reformed theology. A growing interest in theological education, evangelical history, and the Reformed faith has led many to Edwards. While these two movements do not account for all of the reception history of Jonathan Edwards in Latin America, they do reveal broad trends about both Latin American Protestantism and the appropriation of Edwards in Latin American contexts.


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