Sunday Sermon - Anti- Church

From the Middle Ages up to probably the nineteenth century Churches commanded real political power in most countries. The Church could dictate what human behavior was allowable and what human ideas were allowable, and they worked hand in glove with political rulers. The Church ostensibly proclaimed that the powerful had obligations toward the powerless, of the rich toward the poor, but there was never any means by which this ethic was enforced.


Catholicism and Protestantism alike preached acceptance of the “station” to which you were born into and that God had “appointed” you. These days in the hymn “All Things Bright And Beautiful” the actual original words:

″The rich man in his castle,
The poor man at his gate,
He made them High and lowly,
He ordered their estate″

are now conveniently omitted due to its endorsement of the class system. The Church promoted ideas of social cohesion only for the preservation of the status quo. It stands to reason, therefore, that socialists learned to look upon religion with a hostile eye. A long history of abuse, oppression and betrayal lies behind that hostility. Whoever defends the exploiters and who helps to prolong this present misery, is our mortal enemy.

The Church and the clergy first fought the socialists with threatening sermons, slandering them and condemning the “covetousness” of the workers. They turn the church and the pulpit into a place of reactionary political propaganda. “Materialism” may either mean low sordid aims as opposed to higher idealistic and altruistic ones money-grubbing, profiteering, the sinking of the human soul in mere selfish gratification, or the pursuit of gain – or it may mean a philosophical theory of the world intrinsically opposed to the theological outlook on the said world. Now these two meanings of “materialism” have nothing whatever in common with each other. The one stands for a mode of life and conduct, the other for a theory of the universe. But it is the trick of the popular Christian to mix up these two meanings of “materialism” and thus to keep the term swimming in vagueness, so they may appeal first to one sense in which it is used, and then to the other.
The Church hides its real purpose and does not face the workers any more as an open enemy, but as a false friend. They say socialism and religion are in harmony and that socialism is practical Christianity. The old god is dead and many men of the cloth now endeavour for us to worship their new god. They full of goodness and pity and who do not seek gain; these are always ready to help the poor. In this way these fishers of men try to catch us in their net. They teach humility.

We do not find it strange that those creationists who demand a literal reading of the bible fail to appreciate Acts chapter 4 verses 32-35 “no-one regarded as being his what belonged to him; everything was in common. Those who possessed lands or houses, after having sold them, brought the proceeds and laid them at the feet of the Apostles. And to each was distributed according to his needs.”

The Church ceased to preach this community and the dividing up of goods. The economic relations between the people and the clergy underwent a great change. They formed an order apart and separated from the people. They were protected by the government. The faithful no longer had contol over the property of the Church. The revenues of the Church were divided into four parts; the first for the bishop, the second for the minor clergy, the third for the upkeep of the Church, and it was only the fourth part which was distributed among the needy. The poor Christian population received therefore a sum equal to what the Bishop received for himself alone. In course of time the habit was lost of giving to the poor a sum determined in advance. Soon the bishops were giving to the poor at their discretion. When the Christian religion became a State religion, the Church demanded that gifts must be brought by the poor as well as by the rich and imposed a special tax, the tithe (tenth part of the crops), and the Church grew richer and richer. In this way the Church acquired enormous wealth. The Popes declared themselves to be the sovereign proprietors of the fortunes of the Church. Celibacy of the clergy was ordained, in order to keep it intact and to prevent the Church wealth from being dispersed. The Church accumulated enormous amount of land. The peasant now had to directly labour for the Church (corvée.) The Church extorted money from the toilers by other methods such as through fees for marriages, burials and baptisms.

The enormous riches piled up by the Church without any effort on its part, come from the exploitation and the poverty of the labouring people. The clergy, no less than the capitalist class, lives on the backs of the people, profits from the degradation, the ignorance and the oppression of the people. Socialists aims at assure humanity happiness here below, not in the here-after. It is precisely this earthly rather than heavenly happiness which the servants of the Church fear. Priests and parsons continually contribute to the ignorance and degradation of the people. It is the socialists who bring good tidings of joy and fellowship, fraternity and equality.

It is a hopeful sign of the times that religion seems to be slackening its hold. It is decaying and dying of it own volition. We wage no separate war on religion but where the priest or vicar serve the interests of our exploiters then we will fight the Church by exposing its hypocrisy. The Socialist Party is a a small, propaganda organisation with an enormous task of advancing the case for socialism and a new type of society and in order to be effective and democratic involves shared values and political perspectives by the membership. As an organisation we do not hold that any member can believe what he please. Man is a social animal. Religion is therefore a social product. Some workers are still very religious. They think that the solution of world problems lies in the masses being converted to christianity. To reproach those workers is quite a mistake. They are not to blame for being religious. They are often quite sincere. Our attitude toward them should be one of sympathy. They simply don’t know any better and efforts should be made to rescue them from their blind beliefs. The best way to win workers away from superstition is to impart to them knowledge and real information.