Word: coxes
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...rubric of "radical theology" for the past ten years or so has taken many forms, from proclaiming and then dissecting the death of God to staging folk-rock masses, none of them particularly "radical" in any substantial way. In fact, none of the so-called radical theologians, including Cox himself, has proved either as substantive or as radical as the three humbler men from whom they learned their stuff, Bonhoeffer, Buber and Tillich...
...time to set questions of definition and purpose straight. If one is to go under the title, Harvey Cox, Radical Theologian, one is bound to explain what one holds the label to mean. Here Cox sets out to explore the dimensions of a "Theology of Liberation." If the work is haphazard, it doesn't lack attempted breadth...
...first major concern is one of subject matter. Western theologians have to a large extent been both provincial and elitist in outlook. Learning from the religions of the poor has not been a serious undertaking in recent theology. "Radical theologians" have not been conversant with Third World religious movements. Cox directs attention to the political radicalization of Buddhism in Southeast Asia and to the revolutionary movements among Catholic priests and laymen throughout Latin America. His indictment of the provinciality of contemporary white Western theologians is strong medicine: "Because we are part of the imposed culture we cannot understand...
...What norms would it adhere to? First of all, primary importance goes to people, not to texts. To interpret a religion one must interpret people, their actions, expressions and goals. And in interpreting religion, the radical theologian forms judgments and takes sides with the oppressed and against the exploiter. Cox embodies the crucial distinction between what a radical theologian might be and what sociologists of religion (and most everything else) traditionally have been. In asserting his commitment to certain values and concerns, Cox has made his norms, however partially formulated, at least explicit and not hidden behind a rhetoric...
...touchstone of these values and concerns for Cox is "liberation;" it is the "plumb stone" by which theology should assess religion. If liberation of humankind is seen as the purpose of Christianity and theology is to serve the purpose of "the faith," then it should recover from its fascination with the "essence" of Christianity (and other faiths) and turn its attention to religion's operation within history...