The Politics of Poverty: A Contribution to a Franciscan Political Theology
This essay reconstructs the medieval practice of evangelical poverty as a resource for contemporary political theology. Francis of Assisi and his predecessors committed themselves to a form of voluntary poverty that directly contested the distribution of social power in twelfth-century Europe. Evang...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
Philosophy Documentation Center
[2015]
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In: |
Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics
Year: 2015, Volume: 35, Issue: 1, Pages: 29-44 |
IxTheo Classification: | CG Christianity and Politics CH Christianity and Society KAE Church history 900-1300; high Middle Ages KAJ Church history 1914-; recent history KCA Monasticism; religious orders KDB Roman Catholic Church |
Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) Volltext (doi) |
Summary: | This essay reconstructs the medieval practice of evangelical poverty as a resource for contemporary political theology. Francis of Assisi and his predecessors committed themselves to a form of voluntary poverty that directly contested the distribution of social power in twelfth-century Europe. Evangelical poverty was for them a critical and liberating practice. Yet they disagreed about how this practice was related to standing norms of ecclesial authority. Francis broke with the earlier movements by defining evangelical poverty as a posture of humility and obedience rather than as a counterclaim on apostolic authority. These movements are worth retrieving both for their shared commitment to a liberating poverty and for the questions they raise about the relationship between poverty and authority. |
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ISSN: | 2326-2176 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Society of Christian Ethics, Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1353/sce.2015.0000 |