Dorothy Stang: Monkeys Cry and the Poor Die, Earth Stewardship as Liberation Ecology - Earth Stewardship: Linking Ecology and Ethics in Theory and Practice - page 397

What does this history of environmental confl ict teach for constructing a Latin
American Earth stewardship? I put the question this way because I assume, following
Ortega, that stewardship “derives from a social operation and therefore responds to
determinations of place and procedure” (Ortega 2011 , p. 270). In what follows,
I propose several answers by suggesting elements or inputs for understanding stew-
ardship within the framework of the Latin American liberation tradition, specifi cally
the theology of liberation. 2 This theological movement emerged forcefully in the 1970s
and, although in recent years has lost much of its original infl uence, has been and con-
tinues to be an infl uential part of Latin American political and ecclesial culture.

27.1 Environmental Thought as Act Two

I begin with methodology. What are the sources of environmental philosophical/
theological thought? That is, what are the originating sources for philosophical or
theological discussion of the environment? In liberation literature, the sources are
concrete historical realities. Thus for the Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff, the
starting point is Earth itself ( 1997 , p. 113). “The Earth is ill,” Boff says, “and threat-
ened” ( 1997 , p. 1). It is “the living superorganism” ( 1997 , p. 15), the poorest of the
poor, and, therefore, we are to be in solidarity with it ( 1997 , p. 113). Ricardo Rozzi
( 2012 , pp. 345, 346), Chilean ecologist and philosopher, proposes that Latin
American environmental ethics is “embedded in the ancient worldviews of
Amerindian people” as well as those of other peoples subordinated by the socioeco-
nomic system. Environmental philosophy should give much consideration, Rozzi
argues, to the “diversity of forms of ecological knowledge and practices rooted in
Amerindian, colonial, and post-colonial languages and cultural habits, which in turn
are embedded in ancestral native habitats and contemporary anthropogenic habi-
tats”. No genuinely Latin American environmental philosophy can be conceived
without incorporating Amerindian culture, Rozzi insists. As a second source he
mentions the importance of dialogue with environmental thought from other parts
of the world. A third source Rozzi proposes, and in my judgment the key for envi-
ronmental ethics and the idea of Earth Stewardship, “is represented by recent social
movements that are catalyzing the incorporation of environmental values into
regional policies, cultural expressions, and citizen organizations” (Rozzi 2012 ,
p. 346).

2 In my judgment, environmental thought from Latin America should be framed within the tradition
of critical thought that has produced liberation philosophy and theology. It refers to “all types of
contemporary Latin American thought that analyze its own Latin American reality, is aware of the
position human beings have in this reality, and adopts transformative means directed toward elimi-
nating all forms of domination, oppression, subordination or alienation” (Sánchez-Rubio 1999 ,
p. 125). See also Ortega 2011 , note 14, for a synthesis of the origin and basis of the philosophy of
liberation in Latin America. Liberation theology is the theological current of the Latin American
liberationist tradition. It is understood as theology for social movements in which Christians are
active participants.