El sentido teológico de “pobreza”, “pobre” y “empobrecimiento”, claves para la comprensión de la “opción preferencial por los pobres” como principio teológico pastoral de la iglesia católica latinoamericana

Abstract

The Catholic Church in Latin America has taken up the pastoral line of the preferential option for the poor in its evangelizing task, which revives the problem of the meaning and scope of this option with the adjective preferential, a problem that is explicit in the question: does the preferential option for the poor imply the option and legitimization of poverty or the struggle to overcome it? Answering this question and consequently locating the meaning and scope of this option requires a qualitative analysis that also includes the conceptual scope and meaning of the poor, poverty, impoverishment and what the term preferential implies for this option in the sociological, philosophical, linguistic, biblical, theological and political ecclesial spheres.