Preliminary Notes on Liberation Theology by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger

"Love consists in the 'option for the poor'; i.e., it coincides with opting for the class struggle. In opposition to 'false universalism''; the liberation theologians emphasize very strongly the partiality and partisan nature of the Christian option; in their view, taking sides is the fundamental presupposition for a correct hermeneutics of the biblical testimony. Here, I think, one can see very clearly that amalgam of a basic truth of Christianity and an un-Christian fundamental option which makes the whole thing so seductive: The Sermon on the Mount is indeed God taking sides with the poor. But to interpret the 'poor' in the sense of the Marxist dialectic of history, and 'taking sides with them' in the sense of the class struggle, is a wanton attempt to portray as identical things that are contrary."