Homelessness and Covid-19 in the City of Tshwane: Doing liberation theology undercover – A conversation with Ivan Petrella

HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies

 
 
Field Value
 
Title Homelessness and Covid-19 in the City of Tshwane: Doing liberation theology undercover – A conversation with Ivan Petrella
 
Creator de Beer, Stephan F.
 
Subject — street homelessness; undercover liberation theologian; deliberative public administration; making space; making plans; making known; making change
Description Ivan Petrella argues that the goals of liberation theology can sometimes be better served by doing it undercover. This article reflects on responses to homelessness during Covid-19 in the City of Tshwane, describing and reflecting upon it from the perspective of a researcher-theologian as well as activist-urbanist. It employed two lenses in its reflection: Petrella’s notion of the ‘undercover liberation theologian’, as well as what is known as deliberative public administration theory, as possibly complementary approaches. It traces ways in which people of faith/theologians participated in the City of Tshwane through means other than explicit theological discourse. It implies that such engagement was not less theological but perhaps more strategic, describing that task of the undercover liberation theologian as that of making space, making plans, making known and making change. Ultimately, it calls for a subversion of suspect models of theological education, suggesting that it is in losing ourselves in the messiness of public processes and multiple solidarities with the poor, that the unfree might experience freedom, and liberation theological goals might find concrete expression.Contribution: This article reflects on responses in the City of Tshwane to street homelessness during Covid-19. It unpacks the notion and role of the ‘undercover’ liberation theologian in local political processes, and how losing ourselves in public processes and multiple solidarities with the urban poor, might help gain freedom for the unfree.
 
Publisher AOSIS
 
Contributor
Date 2020-12-01
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — —
Format text/html application/epub+zip text/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/hts.v76i1.6209
 
Source HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies; Vol 76, No 1 (2020); 10 pages 2072-8050 0259-9422
 
Language eng
 
Relation
The following web links (URLs) may trigger a file download or direct you to an alternative webpage to gain access to a publication file format of the published article:

https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/6209/16390 https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/6209/16389 https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/6209/16391 https://hts.org.za/index.php/hts/article/view/6209/16388
 
Coverage — — —
Rights Copyright (c) 2020 Stephan F. de Beer https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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