Gustavo Gutiérrez-Merino Díaz OP (8 June 1928 – 22 October 2024) was a Peruvian Catholic philosopher, theologian, and Dominican priest who was one of the founders of Latin American liberation theology. His 1971 book A Theology of Liberation is considered pivotal to the formation of liberation theology at large. He held the John Cardinal O'Hara Professorship of Theology at the University of Notre Dame and was a visiting professor at universities in North America and Europe.

Born in Lima, Gutiérrez studied medicine and literature at the National University of San Marcos before deciding to become a priest. He began studying theology at the Theology Faculty of Leuven in Belgium and in Lyon, France.

His theological focus connected salvation and liberation through the preferential option for the poor, with an emphasis on improving the material conditions of the impoverished. Gutiérrez proposed that revelation and eschatology have been excessively idealized at the expense of efforts to bring about the Kingdom of God on Earth. His methodology was often critical of the social and economic injustice he believed to be responsible for poverty in Latin America, and of the Catholic clergy. The central pastoral question of his work was: "How do we convey to the poor that God loves them?"

Gustavo Gutiérrez was born in the Montserrat barrio of Lima on 8 June 1928 to mestizo parents of Hispanic and Quechua descent. He was afflicted with osteomyelitis as an adolescent and was frequently bed-ridden. He had to use a wheelchair from age 12 to 18. He described this time as a formative experience, claiming it instilled the value of hope through prayer and the love of family and friends. Gutiérrez lived in Barranco, and studied at Colegio San Luis; among his close friends during those years was Javier Mariátegui, with whom he later studied medicine. He described this experience as having had a profound impact on his interest in theology.

Gutiérrez initially studied medicine at the National University of San Marcos in Lima in order to become a psychiatrist. He also became involved with Catholic Action, which greatly influenced his later theological arguments.

While in medical school, Gutiérrez realized he wanted to become a priest. He completed his theological studies in the Theology Faculty of Leuven in Belgium and at Lyon in France, where he studied under Henri de Lubac, Yves Congar, Marie Dominique Chenu, Christian Ducoq, and several others. It was also here where Gutiérrez was introduced to the Dominican and Jesuit ideologies, and was influenced by the work of Edward Schillebeeckx, Karl Rahner, Hans Küng, and Johann Baptist Metz. His time in Europe influenced Gutiérrez to discuss the openness of the Church to the contemporary world. He was also influenced by Protestant theologians such as Karl Barth and social scientists such as François Perroux and his idea of development. In 1959, Gutiérrez was ordained a priest.

While studying in Europe, Gutiérrez was exposed to other, non-religious thinkers who had a profound impact on his ideology and the eventual formation of Latin American liberation theology. At the Faculty of Theology in Lyon, he studied Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud – on whom he did a philosophy licentiate at the University of Leuven – and evolutionary theorists traditionally opposed or discouraged by the church. Marx's discussion of class struggle and the material conditions of poverty provided Gutiérrez a framework for understanding socio-economic inequality.

When he returned to Peru in the late 1950s, Gutiérrez began to formulate his understanding of Latin American "reality" – the foundation and driving force of Latin American liberation theology. ^{[page needed]} He wrote: "I come from a continent in which more than 60% of the population lives in a state of poverty, and 82% of those find themselves in extreme poverty." Gutiérrez focused his efforts on the rediscovery of love thy neighbor as the central axiom of Christian life. He contended that the European theology he had studied did have relevance to the oppressive material conditions in Latin America. In 2003, Gutiérrez reminisced that his "parishioners in Lima would ... teach me volumes about hope in the midst of suffering". The relationship of suffering with Christianity would inspire his book On Job, published in 1986. In his parish ministry, Gutiérrez was at one time pastor of the Iglesia Cristo Redentor (Church of Christ the Redeemer) in Rímac, Peru.