Here, Brown is summarizing Gustavo Gutierrez's understanding of genuine spirituality (from a book entitled We Drink from our Own Wells: The Spiritual Journey of a People.):
"He would be reminding them and us that his title comes from a comment of Benard of Clairvaus, that the place from which our spiritual nourishment comes is the place where we think, pray, and work; we begin our spiritual journey where we are, and not somewhere else. If the Latin Americans' "own wells" are located within the liberation struggle to which they are committed, our North American wells will likewise be found in our own situation, as we struggle, for example, with the affluence we so often use exploitatively. In either case, the life of spirituality will be located in the midst of the world's turmoil, rather than in safe havens of disengagement.
This cannot be done, Gutierrez would continue, with an individualistic spirituality, and we would call attention to the important subtitle of his book, the Spiritual Journey of a People, as the reminder that spirituality must be communal. To show that this conviction is not idiosyncratic to himself, he might cite the comment of John de Gruchy from South Africa, another continent where oppression and struggle are daily companions of the Christian:
"The Christian life, while intensely personal, is always communal...The privatization of piety is not part of the Christian tradition and it undermines the Christian life... Christian spirituality is, therefore, the spirituality of Christian community. But it is not Christian community lived in isolation from the world." (De Gruchy, Cry Justice, p. 25)
Having rooted spirituality in the immediate human situation, Gutierrez would then explore the riches of the biblical and historical traditions, in order to pave the way for five interconnected marks of the new spirituality of liberation. They are worth some attention, because they are as true for us in our situation as they are in his.
The first of these is Conversion: A Requirement for Solidarity, and it involves a break with the past and the setting out on a new path that is both personal and social. Conversion involves both an acknowledgement of individual sin and a recognition that ours is a sinful situation, containing structural causes of injustice. So conversion will involve the option to live in solidarity with those who attack sin on both levels. Hunger for God and hunger for bread go together.
A second characteristic is Gratuitousness: The Atmosphere for Efficacy (which we might render in less cumbersome fashion as "Grace: The Basis for Action"). God's gracious love is the source of everything else, including our own ability to love. Such love starts with the concrete need of the other, not with "duty" to practice love. Drawing on Bernano's theme that "all is grace," Gutierrez reminds us that grace provides beauty for our lives, "without which even the struggle for justice would be crippled." Prayer expresses our faith and trust in the gracious God, a "living dialog" that becomes the touchstone of life. There is always "a twofold movement": a full encounter with the neighbor presupposes the experience of grace, and Christ, as our way to God, is also our way to neighbor.
The third note is Joy: Victory Over Suffering. Gutierrez does not gloss over the reality of suffering, be he also insists that the last word is "the joy born of the conviction that unjust mistreatment and suffering will be overcome." Such joy can be found even in a time of martyrdom, for to defend the poor easily leads to suffering and death. Martyrdom "is something that happens but is not sought." And Christians must never create a "cult of death." The only joy that can ultimately sustain us is "Easter joy," a joy that "springs from hope that death is not the final word of history." Those who encounter the cross are led to experience the resurrection.
The fourth mark is Spiritual Childhood: A Requirement for Commitment to the Poor. The task, as Gutierrez frequently remarks, is to be "with the poor and against poverty." The demands are severe: One must assume "voluntarily and lovingly the condition of the needy...in order to give testimony to the evil it represents." To do so will provoke opposition from the privileged, who are not enchanted when those within the church "disassociate themselves from the injustices of the prevailing system." Commitment to the poor means looking on the world of the poor "as a place of residence and not simply of work," sharing in exploitation, inadequate health care, and all the rest but also making new friends, experiencing a new kind of love, and developing "a new realization of the Lord's fidelity."
The fifth mark is Community: Out of Solitude. To be with the poor will mean going through "the dark night of injustice" oneself, enduring ostracization, fear, weariness, cowardice, and despair, not to mention having to make crucial decisions when "nothing is clear." This is when we move "out of solitude" and into community. God does not call us to remain in the desert but to pass through it on our way to the promised land. As we are drawn more deeply into community, we find foretastes of the promised land, even in midst of the desert, places where the death and resurrection of Christ are remembered, and where the Eucharist becomes a point of departure and arrival. The mood is celebration.
Throughout, Gutierrez has been describing spirituality. Throughout Gutierrez has been describing liberation." [pp. 118-121]
Tomorrow, we will look at Redefining Liberation.
