Pope Francis this week called for cooperation between Christians and Marxists as a way to achieve greater “dialogue” and help in the search for the “common good.”
Yeah, except Jesus was essentially teaching socialism:
40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’
44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
You might be confusing it with communism, which seems like it cannot be implemented without totalitarianism. The totalitarianism is what makes it a bad political system and we are shown that we don't need communism for totalitarianism. Best example of that is currently Russia.
It's scary that there are actually people who call themselves Christians and are attracted to such oppressive system.
Yeah but thats just the opium masses crap. Christian Socialism is a thing. Case in point Ceasar Chavez and the sheer amount of work he did for the labour movements. The two systems are compatible.
Marx’s view of communism doesn’t inherently ban religion. His view of religion was that it was a tool by the ruling classes to maintain the status quo against the oppressed, and that under communism religion wouldn’t hold any political power because, by his words, the conditions that allowed religion to hold political power such as inequality wouldn’t be present anymore. But he didn’t call for the abolition of religion or that religion couldn’t exist at all in a communist society, that was more of a Marxist-Leninist way of thinking.
It is a tool by the ruling classes, but alongside a lot of other tools. I don't know Marx view on religion in any deep sense, but I always understood hisvieww as religion emerging as a coping mechanism in some ways, or emerging as a coping mechanism, or just a byproduct of the human experience maybe..?, he does say religion is the heart in a heartless world, etc.
and maybe that's how it becomes a tool, co-opted and utilized for class interests.
Marx literally wrote against enforced atheism in "the Jewish question"(a very unfortunate name in hindsight) which was a defense of Jewish communists keeping their religious and cultural identity.
I'm pretty sure he was involved with the liberation theology movements in Argentina before the previous pope clamped down on it (in his capacity as a cardinal)
Jesus Christ hated rich people; his whole mantra was about sharing and helping the poor. In fact, the church used to help the sick and the poor at first.
Corporatism developed during the 1850s in response to the rise of classical liberalism and Marxism, as it advocated cooperation between the classes instead of class conflict. Corporatism became one of the main tenets of fascism, and Benito Mussolini's fascist regime in Italy advocated the total integration of divergent interests into the state for the common good;[4] however, the more democratic neo-corporatism often embraced tripartism.[5][6]