I can’t find evidence of anti-communism in the Bible?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Curious11
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
The Church isn’t pro-capitalist, just like it isn’t pro-communist either.

Catholicism, I would caution, is neither collectivist nor libertarian. It transcends, undercuts and echoes elements of both i.e. Pope St. John Paul II wrote in 1987, in his encyclical letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis: “The tension between East and West is an opposition… between two concepts of the development of individuals and peoples, both concepts being imperfect and in need of radical correction… This is one of the reasons why the Church’s social doctrine adopts a critical attitude towards both liberal capitalism and Marxist collectivism.”
 
Last edited:
I would argue it accepts the system while asking for more moral concern and charitable spirit.
 
Then your understanding of Catholic doctrine is in error. Even Ayn Rand recognised the church’s actual position.

It was in her 1967 essay “Requiem for Man”, written to condemn Pope Paul VI’s social encyclical Populorum Progressio (because it was critical of capitalism). The pope had had the ignominy in her eyes to condemn it in these terms:
"But it is unfortunate that on these new conditions of society a system [capitalism] has been constructed which considers profit as the key motive for economic progress, competition as the supreme law of economics, and private ownership of the means of production as an absolute right that has no limits and carries no corresponding social obligation." (Paragraph 26)
Click to expand...
She characterized Catholicism as the principal rival to both communism and her own ideology of objectivism:

From The Objectivist, July, August and September 1967, reprinted in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, ch. 24, pp. 297-319.
I have said and stressed for years that capitalism is incompatible with altruism and mysticism. Those who chose to doubt that the issue is “either-or” have now heard it from the highest authority of the opposite side: Pope Paul VI.

The encyclical “Populorum Progressio” (“On the Development of Peoples”) is the manifesto of an impassioned hatred for capitalism; but its evil is much more profound and its target is more than mere politics…On the question of capitalism, the encyclical’s position is explicit and unequivocal…

The Vatican is not the city room of a third-rate Marxist tabloid. It is an institution geared to a perspective of centuries, to scholarship and timeless philosophical deliberation. Ignorance, therefore, cannot be the explanation.

Capitalism is condemned, not for some lesser characteristics, but for its essentials, which are not the base of any other system: the profit motive, competition, and private ownership of the means of production…

If need—global need— as the pope says, is the criterion of morality, if minimum subsistence (the standard of living of the least developed savages) is the criterion of property rights, then every new shirt, or dress, every ice cream cone, every automobile, refrigerator, or television set becomes "superfluous wealth."

It’s either-or. If capitalism’s befuddled, guilt-ridden apologists do not know it, two fully consistent representatives of altruism do know it: Catholicism and communism.

Their rapprochement, therefore, is not astonishing. Their differences pertain only to the supernatural, but here, in reality, on earth, they have three cardinal elements in common: the same morality, altruism—the same goal, global rule by force—the same enemy, man’s mind.

Today, Catholicism and communism may well cooperate, on the premise that they will fight each other for power later, but must first destroy their common enemy [Randism].

So much for those American “conservatives” who claim that religion is the base of capitalism—. [Rand, CUI, p. 316.]
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
Curious11 said:
Common ownership of the means of production in a classless society, preferrably stateless as well
Click to expand...
Way back at post 23 you offered the above definition for communism. Your definition uses Marxist terminology and attempts to strip it of its negative connotations.

The problem you are running into is that you cannot divorce Marxist terminology from Marxian Communism or any other form you are trying to define.The term communism did not come into regular use until Marx in the 19th century, and he very clearly defined his term.

What you seem to refer to is not communism but communalism. This is in harmony with those prehistorical ideas of living together and sharing everything in common.

The key difference is voluntary vs. involuntary. Modern communism is not voluntary. It comes about as the result of armed struggle, and everyone is required to go along with it “or else”. Because so many individuals are fundamentally opposed to being forced to give away their natural rights, communism in practice requires a totalitarian regime to maintain it. This is why you cannot offer up a modern day example of communism that is not also totalitarian.
 
Last edited:
That’s not the point. The point is that, if some form of communism was democratically achieved, the church wouldn’t be against it, provided it wasn’t atheistic
 
But it’s not purely the atheism, as I’ve been noting. It’s also the dialectic of political violence, the inevitability of class struggle, the historical materialism etc.

In terms of democratic socialism, many modern social democratic parties were democratic socialists before the fall of the wall in 1989. They simply abandoned their commitment to common ownership (i.e. British Labour Party removed it from their constitution) after it became politically untenable. But their roots are still democratic socialist.
 
Last edited:
In 1963 I was on a retreat given by a Jesuit priest .

He was a refugee from Lithuania which was then part of the Soviet Bloc .

He would say many times , “In the East they are harsh and cruel .”

But he had no illusions about what he encountered in the West .

He would say many times , “In the West they are soft and lewd .”

He saw here a society dominated by consumerism, materialism, individualism , and hedonism .

He did not see a society moulded by the values of the Gospel .
 
Also, see:
"…In Quadragesimo Anno Pope Pius XI referred to the liberal theory of uncontrolled competition as a ‘poisoned spring’ from which have originated all the errors of individualism. The French hierarchy, commenting upon the same pope’s letter on communism, stated: 'By condemning the actions of communist parties, the Church does not support the capitalist regime. It is most necessary that it be realized that in the very essence of capitalism that is to say, in the absolute value that it gives to property without reference to the common good or to the dignity of labor there is a materialism rejected by Christian teaching…"

- U.S. Bishops, Pastoral Letter (1980) 62.
Click to expand...
This is what Catholic doctrine teaches.
 
Well,we came first…
One of the most beautiful things is to get into the mind of the Church and it is a lifetime,and we are Pilgrims…
And to be honest,some people are more " Catholic" than they think without. realizing, and without offending anyone I mean,but it takes time and. we are very much in a hurry in this world.
 
Last edited:
Curious11 said:
That’s not the point. The point is that, if some form of communism was democratically achieved, the church wouldn’t be against it, provided it wasn’t atheistic
Click to expand...
Atheism is not the only problem. Communism is counter to human dignity and the prolife imperative upon which all other aspects of social justice and the bond between the citizen and the state rest.

Communism is not democratic. This is the entire reason why Marx formulated his concept of class struggle. People do not easily vote against their own interests.

Again, your comments point to some unworkable definition of “communism” you are trying to advance.

What the church would not be against was a voluntary communal government or system where religious freedom is protected.
 
Last edited:
Are you implying I’m more Catholic than I think? I’m not, full atheism is the way to go in my opinion.
 
Last edited:
Communalism is about living in community. Those communities can be communist or not. There are non-communist Kibbutz
 
No, it is you who associates communism exclusively with Marx. There are other forms.
 
Yeah, Maoist communism which killed 50,000,000+ people, Kim Il-Sung, Fidel Castro. These all differ from Marxist Russian communism.
 
It would be good to see poitiicized Catholics devoting as much energy as was given to battling Communism when it was at its height to battling a society whose basic principles are consumerism, materialism, individualism , and hedonism …
 
Curious11 said:
No, it is you who associates communism exclusively with Marx. There are other forms.
Click to expand...
The word communism did not come into regular use until Marx in the 19th century. He defined the term.

Here is the etymology: communism | Origin and meaning of communism by Online Etymology Dictionary

So, it is you who insists on redefining the term. It would be more productive for you to choose another term that better fits what you are actually talking about like communalism!
 
giuseppe96 said:
Yeah, Maoist communism which killed 50,000,000+ people, Kim Il-Sung, Fidel Castro. These all differ from Marxist Russian communism.
Click to expand...
Exactly. They all ultimately end up being totalitarian and violent.
 
Last edited:
Communism is purely materialistic, it is based purely on this world. In Communism everything is the property of the collective, even individuals. Men have no worth on Communism other than as a materialistic tool to be used for the benefit of the state. The state becomes the all and there is no morality other than the needs of the state. It is pure materialism with no spiritual dimension. It is an amoral system that controls (or rather owns) the individual and to which the individual is required to give his complete allegiance. This is counter to Christianity and it replaces God with the state.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top