Peter Sammons considers what Social-ism is.
THE GREAT “I AM”?
It’s only recently I’ve troubled to think about the word (and the concept of) “Socialism” from a specifically Christian perspective.
Of course there’s a perspective – amongst some – that Christians must ipso-facto be “right wing” (whatever that may mean!), as especially in that idea of an “evangelical right wing conservative”. By contrast, others think that ‘socialism’ is in some sense a natural outworking of Christian ethics in this troubled and structurally unfair world. Some even claim “Jesus was the first Communist”!!
Two months ago in Christian Comment we made the very simple point that God is not hugely invested in Mankind’s party politics: https://christiancomment.org/2024/05/31/election-alert/
But what of “social-ism”? What does it say, and what is it trying to achieve? And can it ever be a sound Christian expression?! This is what ‘socialism’ is, according to ‘Wikipedia’. “an economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes the economic, political, and social theories – and movements – associated with the implementation of such systems”. The whole piece can be followed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism . We can say, then, that social-ism sees Mankind as taking responsibility to build a society in Man’s image. Perhaps in this sense ‘Man’ sees himself as the great “I AM”, in contradistinction to God Who has already declared Himself in precisely that term. See Exodus 3:14.
Social-ism’s leitmotivs can perhaps be summed up as self actualisation, fairness, and personally own-able “rights”. As a Christian I find it now slightly alarming that everyone seems to have “rights” but no one clearly has responsibilities. And if there is a responsibility, then it is owned by the State who charges any associated financial costs to the taxpayer!
BABYLON BY ANOTHER NAME?
Socialism tries to create a society (even a world) built in Man’s image, and to achieve Man’s ambitions. When I refer here to ‘Man’, I mean of course Mankind or Humankind. Socialism, in this sense, is a natural bedfellow of Humanism. Progressivism is perhaps the most recent manifestation of extreme socialism. Again according to Wikipedia Progressivism “is a political philosophy and movement that seeks to advance the human condition through social reform – primarily based on purported advancements in social organization, science, and technology.” The whole story here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressivism . It is notable that Britain’s Prime Minister even before the 2024 election (which returned a Landslide win despite voter turnout being lower than the previous general election, and the lowest in fact since 2001) described himself first and foremost as a Progressive. Google “is Kier Starmer a Progressive” and you will find many ‘hits’ that can be followed-up.
Genesis 11: 1-9 tells us the spiritual reality that Mankind is determined to be a ‘god’ unto himself – and to “make a name” for himself. This theme is found throughout Scripture and (I would suggest) is found in daily experience today, as it has been in all previous eras. Satan’s key opening lie to Adam and Eve was that if they rebelled, they would be ‘like God’ (Genesis 3:5). That lie persists today and finds its key expression in all those things that collectively we can call “Babel”. It is ultimately “Babel” that Jesus will overthrow in this world. (The best recent study on Babel has to be David Lambourn’s “Babel Versus Bible” reviewed by Simon Pease here: https://christiancomment.org/2022/05/01/babel-versus-bible-2/ (highly recommended!!)).
SOCIAL-ISM AND BABEL-ISM
As a spiritual reality it seems that social-ism is a polite descriptor of a society determined to build a world in its own image. We might just as easily call that Babel-ism. It is of course ironic that many of the early proponents of social-ism were Christians, yet 100 years ago these faced a world of genuine inequalities and profound social traumas that required a degree of governmental guidance/intervention to make life basically tolerable and survivable. Our Christian forbears cannot be seriously criticised for dealing with the issues they confronted – at least in part – through the mechanism of social-ism. Those issues included child labour, squalid and dangerous living conditions, zero employment rights leading to terrible injustices, restricted enfranchisement, and evil class distinctions. Of the latter, perhaps the closest modern equivalent might be Hindutva’s caste system as still practiced in parts of modern India.
WOULD JESUS VOTE AT ALL?
Today’s Social-ism is in a profoundly different place to the historical norm of left-wing politics. As people say in the UK, today’s Labour party is not the party of Kier Hardie. Social-ism today promotes and legislates agendas that not only cut across normative Christian understanding and places Christianity on a direct collision course both with the Socialists and with the Socialist State apparatus, but place Christians beyond the pale. In reality this seemingly new development only returns the lot of the Christian to the historical norm right across the globe. It is not so much Christians that are hated, ultimately it is Jesus that is hated by this world (John 15:18-27). And there are many “isms” in this world that so hates Jesus, in practice if not in rhetoric (think for examples of Social-ism, Communism, Fascism, Humanism, Islamism; the list is pretty much endless, it would seem!).
God is not an admirer of Mankind’s political systems, albeit sometimes God undoubtedly chooses to work within and through political systems and through individual politicians, whether or not they personally owe Him allegiance. But the bulk of the world’s political systems are thoroughly God-opposed and the ultimate end for this world is it’s rebellion against all that is of God, and the promotion of (possibly even the political election of) a world leader who the Bible identifies by the moniker “Antichrist” – which might also be translated as “Instead of Christ”. The man who will ultimately demand to be worshipped as “god”.
Since all political parties today pursue policies that are fundamentally opposed to the Judeo-Christian worldview, personally I doubt that Jesus would ‘vote’ for any politician. In fact I doubt He would have done so at any time in history, but that is plainly a debatable and philosophical viewpoint! What Jesus did tell us very plainly is this: “render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and render to God what belongs to God” (Mark 12: 17). The clear implication here for a Christian is that when Caesar makes demands that are not within Caesar’s remit, we still follow God, even if this places us on a direct collision path with Caesar, in all his differing forms. No one said it is easy, or cost-free, to be a Disciple of Jesus – to be a Christian.
LEITMOTIVS – VERSUS ONE RIGHT ONLY
We said earlier Social-ism’s leitmotivs can be summed up as self actualisation, fairness, and personally own-able “rights”. It’s pretty much the eternal shout ‘I AM, and you’d better recognise it as I have a raft of rights that you cannot escape!’ (But it seems I have absolutely no responsibilities!).
As Christians we argue that Mankind has only one “right” spelled-out in Scripture. It is an inalienable right and not even Satan can take it away from any human being. “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name; who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12-13).
Now that’s a right worth having!
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Peter Sammons is commissioning editor at Christian Publications International. He is author of “Rebel Church” (2013), “The Prince of Peace” (2015) and “Three Days and Three Nights – That Changed the World (co-authored with David Serle) in 2019.
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Interesting, because it is published by Wilberforce publications is this book
https://www.wilberforcepublications.co.uk/the-moral-case-for-conservatism If nothing else, the book demonstrates that a ‘conservative’ approach to politics and society does not have to be inimicable to Christian worldview, as so many claim ! The book was usefully reviewed here: https://prophecytoday.uk/study/resources/item/1564-review-the-moral-case-for-conservatism.html
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