According to Robert Rodes, liberation theology—with its concern for the individual's to respond to building God's kingdom; its demand that Christians align themselves with the oppressed and work to reform or dismantle unjust social structures; and its recognition of the Church as a sign of God's salvific and liberating purpose—gives to the pursuit of justice through law an eschatological significance independent of any immediate or predictable consequences. Rodes assigned new importance to laws that symbolize aspirations they cannot fully implement, and laws that confront destructive forces they cannot fully implement, and laws that confront destructive forces they cannot fully contain. He begins by briefly discussing the basic tenets of liberation theology and relates them to goals that traditional jurisprudence has assigned to law. In later chapters he develops agendas for ameliorating some of the major problems in contemporary American life, rootlessness, powerlessness. He addresses each in light of past perceptions, how a Christian should respond to them today, and how law can respond to them.
About the Author :
Robert E. Rodes, Jr., is Professor of Law at the University of Notre Dame Law School. His previous books include The Legal Enterprise, Ecclesiastical Administration in Medieval England, and Lay Authority and Feformation in the English Church.
Review :
"There is much here to cheer, and much to argue with. Both are important. The understanding of law as aspiration, promise, and guidance is a bracing antidote to the reductionist view of law as little more than mechanical precedent and instrument of coercion. Whether or not our society has a shared understanding of the common good sufficient to make Mr. Rodes's proposal work is very much in question. Law and Liberation contributes to our thinking about that critical question, and that is an important contribution indeed. " —Richard John Neuhaus, author of The Naked Public Square: Religion and Democracy in America, and Dispensations: The Future of South Africa as South Africans See It.
"Robert E. Rodes, Jr., preeminent among Anglo-American jurisprudents for his marriage of the common law to the principles of theology, is unique in his construction of a Christian jurisprudence. In Law and Liberation Rodes addresses the malaise and dilemmas of a consumerist society with brilliant candor, warm charity, and comprehensive wisdom. His approach will please only those who are not the slaves of self-interest, institutional bias, or partisan ideology." —John T. Noonan, Jr., United States Circuit Judge
