[9] Gutierrez' reading of the Biblical prophets condemning oppression and injustice against the poor (i.e. Jeremiah 22:13–17) informs his assertion that to know God (orthodoxy) is to do justice (orthopraxis).

[10] Cardinal Ratzinger (the future Pope Benedict XVI), however, criticized liberation theology for elevating orthopraxis to the level of orthodoxy.

The transcendental model proposes that constructing a contextualized theology is not about producing a particular body of texts, but is instead about attending to the affective and cognitive operations in the self-transcending subject.

This model is not about finding right answers that exist in some transcultural realm, but rather revolves around a passionate search for authentic expression of one's religious and cultural identity.

[14] The term transcendental echoes the "transcendental method" created by Immanuel Kant in the eighteenth century and developed in the twentieth century by thinkers like Pierre Rousselot, Joseph Marechal, Karl Rahner, and Bernard Lonergan, all attempting to understand a genuine "intellectualism" they found in Thomas Aquinas with regard to modern subjectivity and historical consciousness.

In regard to so much of western culture, it seems that Christianity today must speak a word of radical dissent and offer an alternate way of living.