Gustavo Gutiérrez - Church Quotes

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By keeping historical events in their proper perspective, theology helps safeguard society and the Church from regarding as permanent what is only temporary. Critical reflection thus always plays the inverse role of an ideology which rationalizes and justifies a given social and ecclesial order.

Gustavo Gutiérrez
Faced with the urgency of the Latin American situation, the Church denounces as insufficient those partial and limited measures which amount only to palliatives and in the long run actually consolidate an exploitative system.

Gustavo Gutiérrez
The Church cannot be a prophet in our day if she herself is not turned to Christ.

Gustavo Gutiérrez
Although until recently the Church was closely linked to the established order, it is beginning to take a different attitude regarding the exploitation, oppression, and alienation which prevails in Latin America. This has caused concern among the beneficiaries and defenders of capitalist society, who no longer can depend on what used to be - whether consciously or unconsciously - one of their mainstays.

Gustavo Gutiérrez
People are also more keenly and painfully aware that a large part of the Church is in one way or another linked to those who wield economic and political power in today's world.... Under these circumstances, can it honestly be said that the Church does not interfere in "the temporal sphere"? Is the Church fulfilling a purely religious role when by its silence or friendly relationships it lends legitimacy to a dictatorial and oppressive government?

Gustavo Gutiérrez
Christendom is not primarily a mental construct. It is above all a fact, indeed the longest historical experience the Church has had. Hence the deep impact it has made on its life and thought.

Gustavo Gutiérrez