Religion and development have been intertwined since development's beginnings, yet faith-based aid and development agencies consistently fail to consider how their theology and practice intersect. This book offers a Christian theology of development, with practical solutions to bridge the gap and return to truly faith-based policies and practices. Development aims to raise the living standard of the world's poor, mainly through small-scale projects that increase economic growth. A theology of liberation provided a critique to development practice, but a specific theology of development is still lacking, and many faith-based aid agencies have failed to adapt their practice. In applying theological thinking to development, the author argues that aid agencies need to address the entrenchment of unequal power relations, and embrace a holistic notion of development, defined by the needs of those most marginalized, instead of by a focus on economic growth. Development organisations need to consider the distinction between charity and justice, and to empower people in the Global South, paying particular attention to the intersections of race, class, sexuality, religion, and the environment. Overall this book is a powerful call to upend development practice as it currently exists and to return faith-based organizations to following Christian practices. It will be an important read for religion and development researchers, practitioners, and students.

For four decades now, Marc H. Ellis has sought to rethink Jewish tradition in light of the prophetic imperative, especially with regard to the need for geopolitical justice in the context of Israel/Palestine. Here, twenty-two contributors offer intellectual, theological, political, and journalistic insight intoEllis's work, connecting his theological scholarship to the particularities of their own contexts. Some contributors reflect specifically on Israel/Palestine while others transfer Ellis's theopolitical discussions to other geopolitical, cultural, or religious concerns. Yet all of them rely on Ellis's work to understand the connections of prophetic discourses, religious demands, social movements, and projects of social justice. Paying particular attention to global racism, sexism, ethnocentrism, white supremacy, and current neocolonial practices, the contributors also address minoritized liberation theologies, the role of memory, exile and forgiveness, biblical hermeneutics, and political thought. In diverse and powerful ways, the contributors ground their scholarship with the activist drive to deepen, enrich, and strengthen intellectual work in meaningful ways.

What is good sex from the perspective of liberation theology? Thia Cooper argues that sex can be a way to know God. God created humans with a desire to be in relation with each other. From this understanding, sexual desire, sex, and partnerships are re-imagined positively. Good sex is enjoyable and mutual, an aspect of communion. Good sexual relationships share power, empower the participants, and the wider community. From the perspective of liberation theologies and an analysis of biblical texts, the Christian tradition, and the reality of our sexual experience, this book reframes theologies of partnership, sex work, and reproduction through the celebration of desire and sex.

Religion and development have been intertwined since development's beginnings, yet faith-based aid and development agencies consistently fail to consider how their theology and practice intersect. This book offers a Christian theology of development, with practical solutions to bridge the gap and return to truly faith-based policies and practices. Development aims to raise the living standard of the world's poor, mainly through small-scale projects that increase economic growth. A theology of liberation provided a critique to development practice, but a specific theology of development is still lacking, and many faith-based aid agencies have failed to adapt their practice. In applying theological thinking to development, the author argues that aid agencies need to address the entrenchment of unequal power relations, and embrace a holistic notion of development, defined by the needs of those most marginalized, instead of by a focus on economic growth. Development organisations need to consider the distinction between charity and justice, and to empower people in the Global South, paying particular attention to the intersections of race, class, sexuality, religion, and the environment. Overall this book is a powerful call to upend development practice as it currently exists and to return faith-based organizations to following Christian practices. It will be an important read for religion and development researchers, practitioners, and students.

'If Enrique Dussel had been born in the United States, France or Germany he would be an intellectual celebrity. Author of dozens of books in Spanish, few have been translated into English. This book seeks to begin to remedy this injustice.' Ivan Petrella, Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, University of Miami Politics of Liberation presents a world political history, a partial and initial attempt at describing the history of political actors, the 'people', and their philosophical inspirations. It is a decolonizing of political history to begin to tell the accurate world story. In order to explore a politics of liberation a true world political history has to be told and understood. The frameworks to be overcome include: 1. Helenocentrism, which neglects the non-Greek and non-Roman influences on Greece and Rome; 2. Westernization, which neglects the Byzantine world among others in terms of political development; 3. Eurocentrism, which neglects or denigrates the world outside of Europe when describing political history; 4. the periodization of political history according to European standards; 5. the falsely assumed secularization of politics; 6. the colonizing of Latin American and other peripheral political philosophies; and 7. the exclusion of Spain/Portugal and Latin America from modernity. This is not simply one alternative reading, but it is a counter-narrative, describing the world's tradition of politics. It examines what has been said and what has not even been investigated. The starting point is the suffering of the people. Enrique Dussel is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the Iztapalapa campus of the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana (Autonomous Metropolitan University, UAM) and also teaches courses at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (National Autonomous University of Mexico, UNAM). He has an undergraduate degree in Philosophy (from the Universidad Nacional de Cuyo in Mendoza, Argentina), a Doctorate from the Universidad Complutense of Madrid, a Doctorate in History from the Sorbonne in Paris. He is the founder with others of the movement referred to as the Philosophy of Liberation, and his work is concentrated in the field of Ethics and Political Philosophy. Thia Cooper is Assistant Professor in the Religion Department of Gustavus Adolphus College in Saint Peter, MN and author of Controversies in Political Theology: Development or Liberation (SCM Press, 2007).

Controversies in Political Theology addresses the question of whether Christians should be struggling towards development or liberation. It explores the theologies of development and liberation, from their beginnings in the 1960s through their changes to the central arguments today. The contrasts are examined in the practice of faith-based aid agencies. The understanding of how to practice justice differs widely for development theology and liberation theology. Whilst the theology of development remain focused on the economic realm, on trade and consumption, the theology of liberation expands the discussion beyond the economic realm to deal with politics, race, gender and culture more generally. These different concepts of justice lead to very different actions in communities around the world. This book provides students with access to an in-depth view of these practices in a clear and concise context. The book looks not only at the theologies themselves but also how they came to emerge, and how they stand in contrast across the globe today. Full Text - Short