Quotes from Gustavo Gutiérrez

An essential clue to the understanding of poverty in liberation theology is the distinction, made in the Medellín document "Poverty of the Church," between three meanings of the term "poverty": real poverty as an evil—that is something that God does not want; spiritual poverty, in the sense of a readiness to do God's will; and solidarity with the poor, along with protest against the conditions under which they suffer.

The cowardice that keeps silent in the face of the sufferings of the poor and that offers any number of adroit justifications represents an especially serious failure of Latin American Christians.

As Teresa of Avila says, "God does not give himself entirely to us, unless we give ourselves entirely to God.

True love exists only among equals, "for love effects a likeness between the lover and the object loved."23 And this supposes an ability to approach others and respect their sensitivities.

Love of Enemies' does not ease tensions; rather it challenges the whole system and becomes a subversive formula. Universal love comes down from the level of abstractions and becomes concrete and effective by becoming incarnate in the struggle for the liberation of the oppressed.

Lord, I do not attempt to comprehend Your sublimity, because my intellect is not at all equal to such a task. But I yearn to understand some measure of Your truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand in order to believe but I believe in order to understand. For I believe even this: that I shall not understand unless I believe.3

There is no authentic evangelization that is not accompanied by action in behalf of the poor.

Flesh and spirit are not juxtaposed domains, but are principles of activity that give rise to processes that in all their manifestations intermesh in the life of the Christian.

The unqualified affirmation of the universal will of salvation has radically changed the way of conceiving the mission of the Church in the world. . . . The work of salvation is a reality which occurs in history.

The praxis on which liberation theology reflects is a praxis of solidarity in the interests of liberation and is inspired by the gospel.

So true is this that if we do not respond to the demands of the present, because we do not know in advance whither we may be led, we are simply refusing to hear the call of Jesus Christ. We are refusing to open to him when he knocks on the door and invites us to sup with him.

The recovery must rather be—let me repeat—the result of an effort to be faithful, in both prayer and concrete commitments, to the will of the Lord in the midst of the poor.

We are thus in the presence of a new and stinging irony: the friends with their carefully developed theological speeches have not in fact produced more than spontaneously foolish and indeed almost blasphemous responses to the situation.

Job's hope will be confirmed by the vision of God: "I myself shall see him."19 Not as an enemy or even a stranger20 but as a friend, someone close to him. Job reaffirms his conviction that he will see God with "his own eyes." This hope causes his heart (literally, his kidney) to burst—that is, it makes him happy in the midst of his trials.

There is a style of life that gives a distinctive personality to one manner of being a Christian. This manner is in fact a limited manner, for no spirituality can claim to be the way to be a Christian. It is simply one way among others.

poverty is a complex human condition, and its causes must also be complex. The use of a variety of tools does not mean sacrificing depth of analysis; the point is only not to be simplistic but rather to insist on getting at the deepest causes of the situation, for this is what it means to be truly radical.

It is a question of social realism, of becoming aware of an already given situation, to start from it, and to modify it.

This is what many Christians are now learning in Latin America. To be followers of Jesus requires that they walk with and be committed to the poor; when they do, they experience an encounter with the Lord who is simultaneously revealed and hidden in the faces of the poor (see Matt. 25:31–46, and the fine commentary in PD, nos. 31–39).

In liberation theology the way to rational talk of God is located within a broader and more challenging course of action: the following of Jesus.

The unqualified affirmation of the univeral will of salvation has radically changed the way of conceiving the mission of the Church in the world. . . . The work of salvation is a reality which occurs in history.

There are not two histories, one profane and one sacred, 'juxtaposed' or 'closely linked.' Rather there is only one human destiny.