First, I don’t know where I have to put this kind of question on Lemmy so I’m asking it here. Marx viewed religion as a negative force, often referring to it as the ‘opiate of the masses.’ If someone is religious and also identifies as a Marxist, do you think that’s contradictory, or is it just a matter of mislabeling themselves? Would it be more accurate for them to call themselves a socialist instead of a Marxist?
This is a popular take on Christianity that I’ve most often encountered on Reddit but isn’t quite true. Else one would have to wonder why the early church didn’t evolve into a socialist state. The reason is that people are frequently urged to be charitable, but this is ultimately voluntary and led by ones conscience. But this is consistent with being a moral voice in capitalist societies.
Jesus told specific wealthy people to give away various portions of their wealth, but he told his poorer followers to leave everything. The impracticalities of his ethic were oriented around the end of the world being imminent (Mat 24:34), not an enduring way of ordering society as they evidentally weren’t self sustaining: his ministry depended on donations from wealthy women (Luke 8:3). Paul told his church when asking for aid for another church that he wanted to see “equality” (2 Cor 8:13). But, again, it was voluntary (2 Cor 8:8).
This was Luke writing in Acts
When the first believers met in the temple courts they voluntarily (from time to time) donated money to the apostles care and they saw to everyone’s need (Acts 2:44). But then this is never heard from again. And instead what you see in the years following is people like Paul appealing to people’s conscience to give from their private possessions.
Because ultimately, right from the start, private property and private control prevailed (for example: Joseph of Arimathea was allowed to remain wealthy, Peter escaping from jail he goes to John Mark’s mother who not only owns a house but also a servant girl - Acts 12:12-13 etc). And while it’s certainly true church leadership urged people to be generous to those less well off, this was never compulsory (never instituted as a tax). The church in the bible did not even institute the old Jewish law of tithing (compulsory donation of 10%) despite what modern pastors would like people to believe. Instead not only was the giving voluntary but the amount was up to the giver.
Which is probably why Christianity has melded into the various systems of government seen in the West, from dictatorships to market driven social democracies. It’s quite a chameleon. Because it tells individuals how they ought to behave but says very little (if anything) about how a state or market ought to behave.
Voluntary association is one of the defining traits of anarchist collectives though. None are compelled to participate, they do so willingly. The same was true with the early Christian church that existed within the Roman empire.
It is true that we see discrepancies between what Jesus supposedly said, and how the early church was organized. The church was certainly a product of its own time, much like Jesus’ teachings about the position of slaves.
My apologies; it’s been 30-odd years since I believed in a theistic religion, and I misremembered that.
True. Christianity is less concerned with material conditions than with eternal questions. But it seems fairly clear that valuing wealth and power more than spiritual matters is very antithetical to the teachings of Christ or his apostles. Wealth isn’t seen as inherently bad; it depends on what you do with it.
I was raised in a very conservative home, both economically and socially. Even as a young person, it was clear to me that there were some pretty serious discrepancies between what Jesus and his disciples said about wealth, and how my own family and church viewed wealth.