The thing to understand about Christianity is that it was originally a reaction against the Roman empire and then got co-opted and integrated into it. As a result, ever since like the 4th century Christianity has been about basically the opposite of what Jesus talked about. It turns out all that stuff about turning the other cheek stops being relevant if the emperor has his soldiers paint crosses on their shields while they’re out conquering and enslaving the Gauls. Of course, you can keep all the mythological stuff, who cares, but anything relevant to politics or the material world mysteriously seemed to reverse once they entered the halls of power.
The carrot of being accepted into the empire was matched with the stick that if you didn’t go along with the imperial-approved form of Christianity you’d be burned at the stake as a heretic. Any sects still clinging to anti-imperial sentiment get hunted down and exterminated just like when they were being fed to lions, but it’s the Christians doing it to each other now, so you don’t even have to get your own hands dirty. This approach worked way better at suppressing dissent than just trying to ban Christianity altogether.
Of course, a lot has changed over the centuries. And originally it wasn’t perfect or anything either. But imo, it was when Rome Christianized that Christianity Romanized, and ever since its real values have had more to do with Rome than with Jesus. The meme’s, “moneyless, classless, stateless” ideal of heaven is a relic of the original teachings that gets shunted off to the purely mythological side, where it not only doesn’t matter, but also occupies a place in their brain that could have otherwise been sympathetic to making good things happen in the material world. That’s already resolved, there’s no need to worry about it, there’ll be pie in sky when you die.
Oh it makes sense now, recuperation is not a capitalist concept, it is an imperialist concept!
This is why christian fascism should not be the least bit surprising.
Great writeup comrade, I also wanna share this really interesting article from Roland Boer, going over this history a bit, and also outlining the historical intersections of communism and christianity.
Communism is just people trying to create heaven on earth but without God.
Ooh baby, do you know what that’s worth?
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How about (instead of communism) aiming for an economy made up predominantly of co-operatives, like in the Basque country in Spain? The Mondragon federation of co-ops.
That way money is distruted quite evenly but you don’t have to get into the whole politics thing.
Well, it does not have an economy, so why would it have money?
Also, it doesn’t have politics and society in the conventional sense, but men are clearly subordinate to God. Christ is king, this is the way Christians think, so I am not sure this is a correct comparison.
The question of “should Christians strive for a classless society” is a complex one. Egalitarian ideals are very new compared to Christianity, but some Christians now think that in the “fallen world” authority is undesirable as it can be abused. This is not common though.
However, Marxism is an anti-religious ideology. Marxists both believe that religion will disappear after “the base” changes and it will become, ultimately, obsolete, and also have historically persecuted and enacted violence on Christians. So I am not surprised there are not many Marxist Christians.
Well that description suits better anarchism. Also Heaven doesn’t exist it was invented by catholic church like many other stuff they made out of nowhere. Christian God wants to make a non-human monarchy (so God and Jesus as king) and remove all human based States. So pretty much not a communist. Of course you can argue is not anarchism either and is just common monarchy, since there is still some form of authoritarianism, even if not human-based, but from my personal perspective if it truly were a perfect reign I wouldn’t mind at all
Communism is stateless ?? LMAO. OP has no clue what communism really is
Communism is stateless, but not without government, or what Engels calls “The Administration of Things.” For Marx, the “state” is made up of the instruments of society that uphold class distinctions, such as private property rights, and special bodies of armed people for those purposes. Public ownership and socialized ownership quite literally makes those aspects of society redundant, and thus “whithers away.”
Yes, and eggs are perfect spheres in Vacuum. In real world, any and every attempt at communism will lead to a situation where government becomes an all encompassing over bearing State. that’s why Socialism is a far better and much more practical model than communism ever will be.
I think you’re a bit confused on terms, here, as well as history.
Socialism is just an economy where public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, rather than private. It’s a transitional system towards Communism, because markets naturally cebtralize and create efficient networks for central planning all by themselves. Cuba, the PRC, Vietnam, Laos, DPRK, former USSR, etc are all examples of Socialism.
Communism, the point at which the entire global economy can be publicly owned and planned, has not been reached. There have been Communist parties in charge of Socialist economies, but Communism itself is still in the future.
I think if you’re going to be discussing the practicality of Communism and Socialism, you’d do well to familiarize yourself with the systems more. Socialism is not in opposition to Communism, and is a prerequisite for it. I made an introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list if you want to become more knowledgeable about Socialism and Communism.
