Click here to read this essay in word and here to read it in pdf.

Grace, Truth and Development

From the Communist Party across to the corporate spin-doctors and
down to the Development Committees in the shack settlements,
more or less everybody in South Africa speaks the language of
development. In some ways this is a good thing. It indicates a hard
won agreement that the realities of inequality in our society are so

http://info.interactivist.net/node/12222

Liberation Theology
by Lia

In Christianity's construal of Jesus Christ as humankind's deliverer from iniquity, Christ becomes humanity's Liberator as well as its Redeemer. Liberation theology, which is a school of theology within the Roman Catholic Church, embraces this conceptualization of Jesus Christ by understanding him as Liberator of the sinful and of the oppressed. As such, Christ becomes the ultimate vehicle or champion for justice. He is an advocate for the world's impoverished and subjugated. Accordingly, liberation theology constructs Christianity as integral to political activism and positions its tenets as the framework for and impetus behind social justice. In doing so, liberation theology exposes the utility of Christianity by relying on the religion a resource and inspiration in a variety of contemporary social movements, especially those in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa. Furthermore, as it grew out of the Second Vatican Council of 1963 to 1965, liberation theology demonstrates the potential for innovation and evolution within the Catholic faith. However, this school of theology did and does not go unchallenged; in fact, many Catholic perspectives disprove of liberation theology for its Marxist basis. Yet, regardless of one's views on its belief system and approach, liberation theology offers pioneering and alterative ways to understand the Catholic religion and pragmatically and inspirationally integrate its teachings in the contemporary world.

Click here to read this article in Italiano.

Politics Beyond the State

by Brother Filippo Mondini

Michael Neocosmos argues that there is a politics beyond the state and that, within this form of politics, lies the true and trustworthy alternative to the status quo. This 'politics beyond the state' is carried out by active citizens who think, and who engage themselves in politics as militants rather than as politicians. In Neocosmos' words, citizenship, from an emancipatory perspective, “is not about subjects bearing rights conferred by the state, as in human rights discourse, but rather about people who think becoming agents through their engagement in politics as militants/activists and not politicians”.