# Raúl Zegarra Assistant Professor of Roman Catholic Theological Studies ![Raúl Zegarra](/sites/g/files/omnuum5526/files/styles/hwp_4_5__320x400/public/2025-11/10062025-RaulZegarra-1664.jpg?itok=NPHBBPKV) laptop\_windows [Personal Website](https://www.raulzegarra.com/home) ## Education - MPhil, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú - MTS, University of Notre Dame - PhD, University of Chicago ## Profile Raúl E. Zegarra is the Assistant Professor of Roman Catholic Theological Studies. He graduated as his class valedictorian from the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú with a BA in philosophy. He holds master’s degrees in philosophy and theology from the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú and the University of Notre Dame, respectively. He holds a PhD in Theology (with honors) from The University of Chicago. Zegarra’s research focuses on the relationship between faith and politics, with particular emphasis on how this relationship shapes the identity and commitments of marginalized groups. He is the author of four books, multiple book chapters, academic articles, translations, and op-eds. His first book (supported by a grant from the Latin America-Germany Scholarship Association, ICALA), *Una fe solidaria con el tiempo* (2013), is a comparative study of two of the most important post-Vatican II theological projects: Gustavo Gutiérrez’s liberation theology and David Tracy’s correlational theology. His second book, *La subversión de la esperanza* (2015), is a collection of ten studies that puts liberation theology in conversation with contemporary philosophers and theologians such as Emmanuel Levinas, Slavoj Žižek, Martha Nussbaum, Johann Baptist Metz, Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, and Elizabeth Johnson, among others. His third book, *Dos lenguajes teológicos* (2016), develops a framework to understand the role of religion in the public sphere, drawing from the approach to the study of religion pioneered by William James in *The Varieties of Religious Experience* and the political theology of Gustavo Gutiérrez. His fourth book, *A Revolutionary Faith* (Stanford University Press, 2023), is devoted to liberation theology’s contributions to a theory of social justice that welcomes the role of religious commitments. Zegarra is currently working on two new book projects. The first project, provisionally titled *Sacred Identities: Latinos and the Intersectional Politics of Faith,* is a critique of the sacralization of the politics of identity often present in Latinx theology’s approach to questions of race, gender, and religion. The book develops an alternative framework that advances moral universalism, while embracing contingency and particularity, and acknowledging the moral wrongs perpetrated against racial and ethnic minorities. The second project, provisionally titled *The Darker Side of Decoloniality: Multiple Catholicisms and the Emergence of Latin American Modernity*, puts forth an alternative narrative of the process of colonization of Latin America. The book argues that most decolonial thinkers in the region have misrepresented the role of religion, particularly Catholicism, in the process of colonization, almost completely ignoring the religious forces challenging colonial rule and, thus, precluding liberatory *religious* rearticulations of modern ideals. Zegarra’s most recent awards include the New Scholar Essay Prize for Catholic Studies in the Americas (Fordham University’s Curran Center for American Catholic Studies, 2023), for his article “The Preferential Option of the Poor: Liberation Theology, Pentecostalism, and the New Forms of Sacralization” (*European Journal of Sociology,* 2023), and the Manfred Lautenschlaeger Award for Theological Promise (University of Heidelberg, 2021), for the manuscript later published as *A Revolutionary Faith* (Stanford, 2023). ## Courses View [HDS courses taught by Raúl Zegarra](https://courses.my.harvard.edu/psp/courses/EMPLOYEE/EMPL/h/?tab=HU_CLASS_SEARCH&SearchReqJSON=%7B%22ExcludeBracketed%22:true,%22PageSize%22:%22%22,%22TopN%22:%22%22,%22PageNumber%22:1,%22SortOrder%22:%5B%22SCORE%22%5D,%22Facets%22:%5B%5D,%22SaveRecent%22:true,%22CombineClassSections%22:true,%22SearchText%22:%22(%20Zegarra%20)%20(ACAD_CAREER:%5C%22HDS%5C%22)%22%7D) in the my.harvard Course Search. Also see [FAS courses taught by Raúl Zegarra](https://courses.my.harvard.edu/psp/courses/EMPLOYEE/EMPL/h/?tab=HU_CLASS_SEARCH&SearchReqJSON=%7B%22ExcludeBracketed%22:true,%22PageSize%22:%22%22,%22TopN%22:%22%22,%22PageNumber%22:1,%22SortOrder%22:%5B%22SCORE%22%5D,%22Facets%22:%5B%5D,%22SaveRecent%22:true,%22CombineClassSections%22:true,%22SearchText%22:%22(%20Zegarra%20)%20(ACAD_CAREER:%5C%22FAS%5C%22)%22%7D) in the my.harvard Course Search. [All Harvard courses](https://courses.my.harvard.edu) ## Selected publications - [*A Revolutionary Faith: Liberation Theology Between Public Religion and Public Reason*](https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=36003)*,* Stanford University Press, 2023. - "[The Preferential Option of the Poor: Liberation Theology, Pentecostalism, and the New Forms of Sacralization](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-journal-of-sociology-archives-europeennes-de-sociologie/article/preferential-option-of-the-poor-liberation-theology-pentecostalism-and-the-new-forms-of-sacralization/4A40203C86607AD8875CAE691F5210A4#article)," *European Journal of Sociology* (2023), Winner of the 2023 New Scholar Essay Prize for Catholic Studies in the Americas by the Curran Center at Fordham University*.* - "[A Tolerant Familiarity with the Illicit: The Catholic Sexual Imagination and its Role in the Abuse Crisis,](https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1mdq5o5/TN_cdi_informaworld_taylorfrancisbooks_10_4324_9781003401513_11_version2)” in: Veronique Lecaros and Ana L. Suarez (eds.) *Abuse in the Latin American Church* (New York: Routledge, 2024). - "[Context-Attentive Theology: On the Rearticulation of Experience in Theological Inquiry](https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/opth-2024-0019/html?lang=en&srsltid=AfmBOordJ-KwqPR69UfiRf49NVCTvFvh6c3zg6Nq1529sY_b15HGzTGH)," *Open Theology*, Vol. 10, No. 1 (2024) ## Support To reach Harvard Divinity School's faculty coordinators, email [div-faculty\_coordinators@calists.harvard.edu](mailto:div-faculty_coordinators@calists.harvard.edu). For media inquiries or requests, please [contact Tyler Sprouse](mailto:tsprouse@hds.harvard.edu) in the Office of Communications. - ## Affiliation [Faculty](/affiliation/faculty) - ## Alpha Grouping [U-Z](/alpha-grouping/u-z) - ## Faculty Type [Faculty of Divinity](/faculty-type/faculty-divinity)