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Reynaldo D. Raluto. Poverty and Ecology at the Crossroads: Towards an Ecological Theology of Liberation in the Philippine Context. Quezon City:
Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2015. 280 pages.
What an auspicious time for a theology combining issues of poverty and ecology! The release of Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si: Caring for Our Common Home in June 2015 and the euphoria surrounding the Paris Environmental Summit in December 2015 have made the well-being of the earth community a front page issue. Father Reynaldo Raluto has made a significant contribution to the discourse on these pressing global issues and has developed a Filipino Catholic theology of liberation addressing the interrelated issues of poverty and the health of the earth community.
Raluto begins his narrative as does any good liberation theologian—with a concrete event demonstrating the reasons for his concerns and the metanoia which brought him to his passion for justice. While a seminarian, he protested the greedy exploitation of the forests in his home, San Fernado, Bukidnon.
The sight of three thousand grassroots church people setting up a human blockade and for almost two weeks lying down on the street deeply influenced Raluto. Mothers even used their babies as roadblocks to prevent logging trucks from passing through. This parish-based environmental protest eventuated in a diocesan advocacy and a government moratorium. Two killings connected to the moratorium further persuaded Raluto that the shape of his vocation was to be a “padre cura” (a priest who cares).
These incidents also demonstrate the central argument of the book:
“Human beings have the common vocation to care not only for the community of human persons but also for the larger community of God’s creation, whose fate is inseparably intertwined with ours” (2). Thus, Raluto is constructing an ecological theology of liberation.
Typhoons in the Philippines during the past decade have had an especial impact on the environment and the poor who live in their paths. This situation has been particularly hard on the lumad, the indigenous peoples who lack protection from such chaos. Climate change threatens to intensify the number of weather disasters and their impact. It is imperative, writes Raluto, that Filipinos not only react with resiliency but also struggle to adapt to and change the conditions that give rise to tragedies. Perhaps it is the sense of nonviolent protest and struggle that distinguishes the liberation theology of the Philippines.
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This grassroots theology recognizes first hand the fact that many indigenous and indigent people from rural areas, in their distinctive closeness to nature, have a more developed mystical capacity to hear the cry of the earth.
Their option to struggle for ecology may be seen as their way of echoing this cry and of expressing their ecological sympathy to the larger public. In this sense, listening to the cry of the poor and listening to the groaning of the earth are logically inseparable acts. Raluto has an especially authentic voice in this regard.
This nine-chapter book is divided into three parts and arranged according to the see-judge-act format. Part one, the moment of seeing, describes the contextual reality which must be addressed. It succinctly deals with the topic of colonial oppression in Philippine history, which has led to the present situation of poverty and ecological crisis. This chapter is paradigmatic as it highlights three aspects of oppression under the colonial period: the sociopolitical oppression experienced by the class of landless Filipino laborers;
the religious oppression suffered by the indigenous Filipinos who tried to practice their animistic religion in the face of Christianization; and the sexual oppression inflicted on Filipino women. This chapter establishes a link between colonial oppression and the present problems of poverty and ecological crisis. To concretize this claim, Raluto focuses on the indigenous peoples in Mindanao. He takes into account the confluence of ideologies that promote human and ecological oppression: the exploitative anthropocentrism, the mechanistic worldview of nature, the capitalist and socialist model of unlimited economic growth. Though the book never loses its focus on the Philippines, it is not much of a stretch to see how similar the ideologies are that impact other parts of the globe. The chapter mirrors much of what Pope Francis articulates in Laudato Si.
In part two, the moment of judging, the reader is offered an exploration of the different ecological perspectives that challenge the anthropocentric worldview: the New Cosmology, the superorganismic ecology, and ecosystem ecology. In dialogue with the proponents of ecological economics, ecological ethics, and the environmental movements of Deep Ecology and ecofeminism, Raluto identifies the interrelated causes of poverty and ecological crisis: the pursuit of unlimited economic growth, the failure to recognize intrinsic value in nature, and the patriarchal view of reality. Repudiating the Church magisterium’s use of a top-down liberation theology, the author promotes instead an upward approach to the “preferential option for the poor” as being more effective and more theologically appropriate. Raluto believes this alternative is a corrective to the ecological theology of the Church
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magisterium, which maintains an anthropocentric perspective, as indicated in its emphasis on the uniqueness of human dignity and in its prioritizing of human interests in the safeguarding of sustainability.
Part three, which is the moment of transformative action, singles out the Brazilian liberation theologian Leonardo Boff as main dialogue- partner. This chapter critically appropriates Boff’s expanded notion of the preferential option for the poor, as well as his corresponding proposal for a holistic notion of liberation—including the aspects of class, culture, gender, and ecology. It also follows Boff to a certain extent, in claiming that the historical events of human liberation are anticipations of the eschatological realization of God’s Kingdom. However, this chapter decidedly broadens Boff’s framework by proposing an ecological theology of liberation in which a nonanthropocentric perspective on God’s Kingdom serves as the central hermeneutic mediation. This step leads us to rediscover the inclusive meaning and the nonanthropocentric perspective on salvation that is implicit in the vision of God’s Kingdom. From this perspective, the indwelling of the Spirit and the incarnation of the Son may be seen as unfolding events of the coming of God’s Kingdom.
One part of transformative action draws on the centuries of colonial oppression that have led Filipinos to develop a culture of struggle against human oppression. One distinctive feature is the current emphasis on process and on building the movement for change through communal action rather than on using direct force. The thrust of transforming oppressive community relationships in the light of God’s Kingdom is central to Filipino theological reflection.
Raluto demonstrates how environmental activism emerged in the Diocese of Malaybalay. It does seem as though the inseparability of the human and ecological faces of oppression is integral to doing a contextual Filipino theology. Raluto emphasizes that we are called not only to build Christian and human communities but also to form “ecological communities” in which both human and nonhuman creatures could appropriately actualize their relationality and communion.
While it is clear that Raluto draws on theologians Leonardo Boff, Jose de Mesa, Karl Gaspar, and Agnes Brazal in making the case for a liberation ethic that construes the human community as part of the earth community, he adds a perspective which, alongside Pope Francis and the Paris Accords, clearly calls for action. I hope that this volume will be seen as exemplary not only for the Philippines but also for other developing countries. It is built on a practical theological base which sees the church as agent. It is both a
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theological ecoethic for the Philippines and a volume which developed nations can draw on to understand the urgency of addressing climate change in all its aspects. I hope that it could be distributed far beyond the Philippines.
One feature that deserves mention is the way Raluto sees the way forward as involving bottom-up and top-down transformation in the agency of the Church. The Church and the state are much more interrelated in the Philippines, and the Church has a far more powerful voice in the Philippines than in most other countries. While he sees the flaws in the Church, Raluto clearly appreciates the way that the Church—from grassroots communities to the magisterium—could be a powerful force of change.
In conclusion, let me say that I used this book when teaching environmental ethics at Saint Vincent School of Theology and also at De La Salle University in Manila. Not only was it an inspired choice, it served to stretch both my and my students’ thinking about the state of the earth community in general and about the Philippines in particular. It is hard to imagine a book with higher or more authentic appreciation of the issues of poverty and ecology in the Philippines.
L. Shannon Jung Cole Professor Emeritus Saint Paul School of Theology
Kansas City, United States [email protected]
Roawie L. Quimba, Teresita M. Francisco, and Amelia M. Sagaral. The Church. Davao City: Blue Patriarch Publishing House, 2011. 184 pages.
In his Apostolic Letter, Tertio Millennio Adveniente, Pope John Paul II writes that “in Christianity time has a fundamental importance.” Revelation takes place in the context of history, and the Church is no exception to this truth. That is the perspective presented by the authors of The Church.
The book’s title suggests an ambitious scale, and the authors approach the matter systematically, beginning with the historical character of the Church and following with the Church’s sacramental character. As more years pass following the Second Vatican Council, it becomes tempting to assume that the Church has always been the way it is today. The Church allows its readers
