Liberation theology is a natural ally of the left

Before I chime in too let me declare my own position. I'm a born-again practicing atheist, albeit brought up as an Ulster Presbyterian.

At Sunday school we would sometimes sing the 19th-century hymn Jesus Bids Us Shine. The last lines go "you in your small corner, and I in mine."

Our minister came from Ballymena, the same town as the Rev Ian Paisley, but there were some traits he didn't share with Ian.

Our man had the audacity to say that he didn't like these last two lines. For him all humanity shared the same corner.

That hymn could have been written about some brothers and sisters of the left.

So bright is our light, we know every nook and cranny of our own ideological corner. But what do we know about the other corners?

Here in Latin America the top table of the Roman Catholic church hosts a feast celebrating perpetual reaction.

Yet the same church came up with liberation theology.

The gaffers in Rome don't much like talk of liberation and the bosses of the Protestant evangelical churches don't care for it either. But many on the left see liberationists as natural allies.

We can't call for left unity, which still remains fairly ill-defined, if we get our knickers in a twist over one set of spiritual and moral codes and practices. The Britain I left was quite a multicultural place.

Perhaps the Star could run some articles on liberation theology, humanism and minority religions in Britain.

Trades councils might even engage with local imams and other spiritual leaders from their diverse communities. We could all do with the enlightenment.

Sam Gordon Leon

Nicaragua