Significant social and historical developments in religious thought: liberation theology (Gutierrez) and its preferential option for the poor, and feminist theology (Daly, Ruether) and its challenge to patriarchy.

What this dot point is asking

This WJEC theme covers significant developments in twentieth-century Christian thought, focused on two movements that read the faith through the experience of the marginalised: liberation theology and feminist theology. You need the central ideas, the key thinkers (Gutierrez; Daly and Ruether), the scriptural and social roots of each movement, and the responses they have provoked within Christianity. AO1 wants accurate knowledge of the movements; AO2 wants evaluation of their claims and impact.

The answer

Liberation theology

Its key ideas are:

• The preferential option for the poor. God takes the side of the poor, so the Church should too, in word and action.
• Orthopraxy and praxis. Right action (orthopraxy) matters as much as right belief (orthodoxy); theology is "critical reflection on praxis", on what Christians do for justice.
• Structural sin. Sin is not only personal but embedded in unjust economic and political structures, which must be changed.
• Marxist social analysis. Some liberation theologians used Marxist tools to analyse the causes of poverty, which became the most controversial feature.

It is rooted in scripture: the Exodus as God liberating slaves, the prophets' demand for justice, and Jesus' proclamation of "good news to the poor" (Luke 4) and identification with "the least of these" (Matthew 25).

Feminist theology

• Radical feminism (Mary Daly). Daly argued that Christianity is so thoroughly male-centred that it cannot be reformed: "if God is male, then the male is God." She eventually moved beyond Christianity.
• Reformist feminism (Rosemary Radford Ruether). Ruether argued that the tradition contains liberating resources that can be recovered: the image of God in male and female alike (Genesis 1), "there is no male and female ... in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3), and Jesus' counter-cultural treatment of women. The aim is to reform, not abandon, Christianity.

Feminist theology has reshaped debates about inclusive language for God, the interpretation of texts used to subordinate women, and the ordination of women, now practised by many churches and still resisted by others.

Responses within Christianity

Both movements have provoked strong responses. The Vatican (in instructions issued under John Paul II) welcomed liberation theology's concern for the poor but warned against reducing salvation to politics and against uncritical use of Marxism. Feminist theology divides opinion between those who see it as a faithful recovery of the gospel's equality and those who see radical forms as a departure from Christian teaching.

Examples in context

Model paragraph (can Christianity absorb these challenges?). Liberation and feminist theology are best understood as internal challenges that test how far Christianity can be self-critical. Liberation theology did not invent concern for the poor; it intensified a theme already present in the prophets and the Gospels, which is why the Church could affirm its core impulse even while rejecting its Marxist tools. Reformist feminist theology likewise appeals to the tradition's own resources, the image of God in all people and Jesus' treatment of women, to argue that patriarchy is a corruption rather than the essence of Christianity. The harder cases are the radical ones: Mary Daly concluded that the tradition is beyond reform, and the Vatican judged some liberationist politics incompatible with the faith. A strong evaluation therefore distinguishes reformist challenges, which Christianity has substantially absorbed, from radical ones, which it has not, rather than treating each movement as a single thing.

Try this

Q1. What is the "preferential option for the poor"? [2 marks]

• Cue. The liberation-theology principle that God takes the side of the poor, so the Church should prioritise them in word and action.

Q2. Name one radical and one reformist feminist theologian. [2 marks]

• Cue. Mary Daly (radical) and Rosemary Radford Ruether (reformist).

Q3. Evaluate the view that feminist theology has improved Christianity. [20 marks]

• What the marker wants. A balanced argument weighing the recovery of equality and reform of practice against claims that radical feminism departs from Christian teaching, with a reasoned judgement.