Among the more moving experiences in Nicaragua
was a discussion with Melisa, a prostitute, on the last night in Córdoba. She
told me about being a mother of two, not wanting or choosing that life, but
selling herself only to try and to gain a better future for her children. The
stoicism she displayed trumped that of Marcus Aurelius, her defiance matched
that of Allende, and her empathy validates Christ’s admonishment to the
haughty: "Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are
entering the kingdom of God ahead of you.” …
It was the concept of structural sin that
brought me to liberation theology, having long since distanced myself from any
consideration of personal sin in a religious sense. The abject bastardization
of Christ’s message in the hands of moralists and reactionaries has alienated
many of us from the core of the Gospel. In being thus alienated, I lost the
critical key: the Kingdom is within us. True, the Kingdom also demands
quite a few drastic structural adjustments upstairs, but ultimately the impetus
and the longing for absolute liberation for humanity has a personal existence,
inseparable from some fundamental component of humanity: the desire to be free.
Malachi Dray
2015 Delegation
No comments:
Post a Comment