The Canaanite Woman and Urban Liberation Theology

This article draws on the culturally transgressive encounter between the Canaanite woman and Jesus in Matthew 15 to consider the nature of social space, diversity and social exclusion on urban housing estates. The article re-frames key emphases within liberation theology, arguing that urban liberation theologies need to be characterised by the prioritising of insignificance, the practice of liberative reversals and a hermeneutics of liberative difference. These key themes are rooted in a recent research project working alongside unemployed young men from a Birmingham housing estate to raise questions for the ways in which the church understands ‘urban mission’ today.