Pastoral Relationship with People with Intellectual ... - Theses

175on the action-object whole, or, more generally, on forms oforientation in the world. 482This statement suggests an ongoing dialectic between analysis and actionthat leads to the evolved hermeneutical understanding suggested earlier in thischapter. This of itself implies a newly-developed praxis every time analysis andaction interconnect. 483 The image of the hermeneutic spiral comes to mind which,of itself, is in contradistinction to the more fixed understanding of truth thatFreire elsewhere refers to as the “circle of certainty.” 484 Such a circle profferstruth and reality as static constructs designed to maintain those oppressed in anormative state of oppression.In relation to this extended reflection, discussion of praxis within theliberationist South American context needs to have its major contextually-basedlimitations acknowledged. Firstly, Freire speaks primarily with a socio-politicalvoice, whereas I speak primarily with a pastoral voice. Freire defines oppressionin terms of silence or loss of voice. I speak pastorally of lost identity. Freiredescribes the need for education programs to enable awareness and literacy. Ispeak of pastoral models that offer a measure of liberation. Freire describes theimpoverished of South America as those with the capacity to be freed to act asautonomous human beings. I speak of people who by dint of their intellectualimpairment are generally limited in their capacity to act as autonomous humanbeings, and who can be seen to need others to advocate for them, to articulate thewords they may not be able to utter.Nonetheless, the cause for which Freire advocates closely parallels thatpresented in this extended reflection. The South American struggle for literacyand voice closely parallels, from a pastoral theological perspective, the SouthAustralian struggle for the liberation, through an appropriate model of pastoralcare, of institutionalised people living with intellectual disability. Praxis thatprovides a forum for critical reflection upon oppressive institutional structuresand practices, and ever more liberating models of living as human beings isfundamental to both contexts.5.5.3 Pastorally-Based Praxis482 ibid., 13.483 ibid., p.17.484 Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 23