Power as a Theological Virtue—Edited Transcript

Posted on May 12, 2015 by PLT Staff

Edited transcript of a presentation given by Lee Stuart at the second meeting of the Lived Theology and Power Workgroup in New York City. Stuart talks about the experiences that led her to the South Bronx and her commitment to improving the area. She argues that the world is structured around the exercise of power and money, and that to make it better requires an exercise of both power and love, working not simply to protest injustices but to build good to replace it.

Excerpt: “Yes, it’s just so much easier to tear down. It’s always easier to tear down, and if you don’t start thinking about how you build up in the teaching and the preaching, our social action too often stops at tearing down. I think this perhaps now really is the theological challenge of the age: how to mobilize for, and how do you create new things.”

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