b'COMBINING EVANGELIZATION AND LIBERATIONAlthough some of the early liberation theologiansmarket loses two points? (EG 53). He denounces in the 1960s may have placed political revolutionwhat he calls the globalization of indiff erence above the gospel message, the most respectedThe culture of prosperity deadens us; we areand internationally well-known liberationthrilled if the market off ers us something new theologians, such as the Peruvian Gustavoto purchase; and in the meantime all those lives Gutirrez, the Salvadoran Jon Sobrino, thestunted for lack of opportunity seem a mere Brazilian Leonardo Boff , and many others,spectacle; they fail to move us (EG 54). He had balance at their core. Even in their cases,declares that we are experiencing a profound though, their sense of urgency and even outragehuman crisis in which the primacy of human could, at times, obscure that balance in thedignity is being denied through the idolatry eyes of other theologians and church leadersof money (EG 55). He dismisses trickle-down in more comfortable parts of the world.theories as expressing a crude and nave trust Like Gutirrez and Sobrino, Pope Francis hailsin the goodness of those wielding economic from Latin America. In Evangelii gaudium, thispower and in the sacralized workings of the Argentinian Pope Francis, without losing hisprevailing economic system (EG 54). He declares balance, shares the urgency and outrage of thethat the socio-economic system is unjust at its liberation theologians. He calls for Christians toroot (EG 59) and that Christians should say no say thou shalt not to an economy of exclusionto the dictatorship of an impersonal economy and inequality. He asks, How can it be that it is(EG 55). He says these things without losing his not a news item when an elderly homeless personsimultaneous focus on the need for the personal dies of exposure, but it is news when the stockinterior transformation of each Christian.POPE FRANCISS SYNTHESISPope Francis ties together themes ofAll three layers of meaning in Pope Franciss evangelization and liberation with the worduse of synthesis are connected with the task of synthesis. His use of synthesis carries with itevangelization in the modern world. Christians three distinct yet overlapping layers of meaningneed to hold the treasure of the gospel in their connected with the heart, authentic expression,hearts. They must be able to share it with and the integration of traditional modes ofothers. They need to be able to understand and thought with modern science and technology. express their synthesis in ways that connect with modern cultures and forms of thought.22 AspireVolume 1//Fall 2019 Subscribe today!smp.org/aspire'