Paulo Freire is considered one of the most influential educational thinkers in the twentieth century, the founder of popular education, and the inspiration for the field of critical pedagogy. Yet as Sternberg asserts "those of us who espouse critical pedagogy and embrace Paulo Freire's visions of praxis and conscientization work out of a tradition, often unknowingly, with deep ties to religious faith" (quoted in Neumann, 2011, pp. 609–610). While many have acknowledged his ties to liberation theology, his deep underlying faith out of which that theology arose is often overlooked.