the pedo coverups should be a dealbreaker.
this post was submitted on 25 Jun 2026
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Absolutely fucking not, there no more fundamentally reactionary institution on Earth than catholic church. And that is even before we go to issues like mass pedophilia, giant corruption or mafia-like practices and structures.
Probably not. Very, very, very unlikely. An institution with 1000 years of reactionary history is not going to change. The teachings of Jesus are for the most part irrelevant in this discussion. As an institution the Catholic Church does not and has never taken them all that seriously. I would be less surprised to see Orthodox support for communism than Catholic, though both are unlikely, as i said, for historical reasons.
Yes communists should work with religious people and not be hostile to religion, but at the same time separating the religion from the inherently reactionary institutions like the Church. Religious people can be progressive and revolutionary, sometimes even individual clerics can be revolutionary, but institutions have their own agendas and raisons d'être, which are probably not compatible with our own.
No shot. Never going to happen. Anticommunism is inherently fundamental to the sort of highly centralized hierarchical structure of Christian ecclesiastical polity.
yeah, the institution that materially supported the color revolution in Poland is totally gonna be our ally, trust
Same with both Lutheran and Catholic Churches in the GDR. They took that freedom of religion and used it to stab the state in the back.
The Catholic Church as it exists now is too bound up in international reaction to become an ally. However, if a country with a large Catholic population wants to become socialist, I believe the socialists in that country should view those churches as an essential node in the ideological battleground, rather than trying to blanket suppress all religion. Keep the state officially nonreligious, but ensure that there are communists in all levels of major religious institutions. Appoint your own bishops and relitigate medieval arguments if you have to - anything is better than ceding all religious ground to the right. Through this process a new Catholic Church can be made, one which is explicitly allied with the goals of socialism and communism.
Im not very well educated in Christianity, but as far as i know Jesus was aligned with communist ideals, he was extremely egalitarian
There is not much sense in trying to argue this talking point, Jesus was progressive for his time but framing him as aligned with communist ideals is a big stretch and frankly disrespectful to communists. I recommend you reading Engels' Socialism, utopian or scientific, you'll see that Jesus falls on the utopian camp with nothing to offer other than idealism.
Do you think we should think of the catholic church as a possible ally or would that be counterproductive?
The catholic church will never ally with any communist movement, the entire institution is practically merged with European finance capital, we could pragmatically, and tbh opportunistically, some of their rhetoric but other than that meh.
Do you think anti-religion is fundamental to Marxism?
Religion is incompatible with materialism, still no need to be an asshole towards religious people.
Do you think the anti-religious stance of the Soviets was a mistake?
China figured out the correct policy later on. However Lenin did not held this anti-religious stance, it was mostly a failure by the leadership in educating the party.
https://redsails.org/on-the-question-of-religion/
https://redsails.org/the-attitude-of-the-workers-party-to-religion/
True, the furthest you could probably go with Jesus is use him to argue in favor of politically neutral pacifism which is what Jehovah's Witnesses do.
Liberation theologists thought differently.
I'm gonna say no because regardless of any circumstances that might make the church and communists temporary allies, the interests of the two groups are irreconcilable. One wants to liberate humanity from the abuse that is enabled and justified by motivated, power serving epistemology, while the existence of the other depends on maintaining that kind of epistemology.
History suggests otherwise.
As for the other questions, I do not think the Soviets did a mistake by doing that, and Cuba and Venezuela are already working within that framework of "alliance", for better or for worse.
On the other hand, if you want to join the CPC you must be atheist, and Lenin seemingly agreed with that position:
The CPC also wrote a longer text about religion, which I personally haven't yet read, but you might be interested in it. https://redsails.org/on-the-question-of-religion/
I believe that studying how other Marxist groups/parties dealt with religion can be insightful for us (and I'm a militant anti-theist).
I do not think that the Catholic church can be revolutionary, actually I believe they will always remain reactionary and will keep defending private property. If anything, catholic workers can be revolutionary, but not the church itself.
Also Pope Pius XII explicitly excommunicated communists in 1949 lol
I do not think that the Catholic church can be revolutionary, actually I believe they will always remain reactionary and will keep defending private property. If anything, catholic workers can be revolutionary, but not the church itself.
Well-said.
On the other hand, if you want to join the CPC you must be atheist, and Lenin seemingly agreed with that position.
https://redsails.org/the-attitude-of-the-workers-party-to-religion/
I dunno about Catholicism but I've toyed with the idea of doing entryism at small churches. They're pre-existing institutions with a low barrier to entry and also one of the last vestiges of community in a lot of the US. It likely wouldn't be useful to engage with franchised ones, but local ones might work. Think Damnation.
Do you think anti-religion is fundamental to Marxism
I don't think Marxism is a religion, it's an analytic method. Thus it can be adapted in all sorts of ways, including ways that accommodate cultural beliefs. Whether that's useful or not is debatable and dependent on the situation.
Whether Lenin believes so is highly relevant to his situation but requires actual analysis to cross-apply to another. Otherwise it's just book worship.
But personally I'm an atheist.
Lenin literally called idealism the justification for religion. He wasn’t chill about it.
Okay
Hell no. The catholic church has literally several edicts against communism. It’s official doctrine that Catholicism and communism are irreconcilable.
Also Catholics are supposed to obey papal authority.
The fawn over catholicism is just weird american larping as irish and because of Calvinism/charismatic Christianity
Fuck no. One deals with things that are real, the other deals with fantasies concocted by ignorant people well over 2000 years ago.
Even if you want to cherry pick all the good things (which isn't even inherent or unique to Christianity) and conveniently ignore everything else, it still has no basis for any of its claims whatsoever. How do you square that with material reality? If there's no original sin there's no need for a messiah.
Lmao they down voted cause they had no response. I love it here
No, the Catholic Church's class interests go against those of the working class. Communism would mean the end of their hierarchical structure, wealth accumulation, and property ownership. This pits them against communists.
Unless the clergy is abolished (extremely unlikely to happen) this will remain true.
I really doubt that they would be fully on board with true Socialism, even if they have less reactionary zeal.
From my experience with Catholics in the US, it would be a hard sell. The rightists did an effective job of tying together anti-abortion and electing their representatives and listening to their pundits. In theory, some of them could be swayed on moralistic grounds, as some are already close to the spirit of communism in what they believe about the treatment of others. But in practice, it can be hard to move the needle.
This may vary based on region and based on how dedicated to the religion someone is.
As for the Catholic Church itself, I doubt it's going to move much until/unless the region it lives and breathes within becomes something run by a communist vanguard. Religious practice doesn't move linearly with state power, but sometimes it has no choice but to move for it, or sometimes it is explicitly used as a tool of state power. So seeing as how imperialist the west still is, I would not expect much from a church whose central body is housed within it.
As it is, the Catholic Church still has unresolved antagonism and disagreement among its patrons about the traditional mass vs. the "novus ordo" (new order). The traditionalists tend to be far more rightist out there in their views. So to my perception, the unity of the Catholic Church is very brittle for decades now, even just on a liturgical level. And then there is the fallout still from the "consequences of their actions". Dealing with all of the abuse scandals that reached a tipping point they couldn't brush aside anymore. I understand they are stricter now in terms of trying to have policies to vet better and keep an eye out for those things, but the damage is already done and doesn't go away so easy.
Do you think we should think of the catholic church as a possible ally or would that be counterproductive?
Very unlikely due to how conservative and reactionary the church currently is (they curbed any attempt by left-wing priests to reform the church in the 1970s - 1990s), but not impossible. The church influences the life of many people in the Global South.
Do you think anti-religion is fundamental to Marxism?
Do you think the anti-religious stance of the Soviets was a mistake?
Helder Camara had an opinion on that;
Câmara identified himself as a socialist and not as a Marxist, but while disagreeing with Marxism, had Marxist sympathies. In the Fallaci interview, he stated, "My socialism is special, it's a socialism that respects the human person and goes back to the Gospels. My socialism is justice." He said, concerning Marx, that while he disagreed with his conclusions, he agreed with his analysis of the capitalist society.
"Helder Camara never denied his communist sympathies and he openly supported dialogue with communists. He believed in the Fátima apparitions but he interpreted its call for the "conversion of Russia" as meaning that the Soviet Union would abandon its anti-religious policies but will not be rejecting communism. He wrote: "And what was the appeal of Fatima for? ... Not for the annihilation of the USSR and China, but for their conversion ... In 1967, the Russian Revolution will celebrate its jubilee ... We must accelerate the pace, there is no more time to waste".
In a poem dedicated to French Dominican priest Louis-Joseph Lebret, Câmara states his belief that Karl Marx is in Heaven, and has him decorating Lebret of behalf of Jesus Christ.
If you're interested in the opinion of Catholic Socialists I recommend reading or looking for interviews of Hélder Câmara, Leonardo Boff, Gustavo Gutiérrez, Jon Sobrino. Theres also some left-wing Catholic Priests who got elected as presidents under a Democratic Socialist platform like Fernando Lugo (Paraguay) and Jean-Bertrand Aristide (Haiti).
of course not. No religion is ally.
Religious are needless narratives and they just keep people far from a rational existence
Everything needless like religions should only be accepted after we reach immortality and autonomy. Security first, then we play (if one wants...)
I don't really know much about how the Catholic church in particular runs. My general view of how religion should be handled under socialism however is that problematic individuals and elements should be surgically removed and excised with care, and the strategy should be to decouple the reactionary elements from the religion as a whole. Antagonizing an entire majority religion and all it's followers to me sounds like a recipe for disaster and a losing war.
I think I'm largely in agreement, assuming I read you correctly.
As someone who grew up in an orthodox christian country, yes jesus is a communist, watch a yt video called "How They Stole Jesus From The Poor" by redgggod. But i thonk american christians are so brainwashed that they cant be turned to the left. Have you watched anything they watch? They get scammed every minute, the most normal thing they watch is the fox news and thats saying something