I am Socialist because of my pro-life postion and because I fimly beleive that the early Communty before they were even calling themselves 'Christians', which was originally a derogative term used by Rome, were the original exponents of socialism 'they held all things in common and no one was in need.' This was not only attested to by the Book of Acts but also many of the early Fathers of the Church. In the modern age, it was Adam Smith who equated the faith and God with Capital and the free market, not the early Fathers of the Church. In so doing, capitalism and the free market makes it holy to be selfish, and exploitative. Self gain, the competitive market and the exploitation of people and nature is allowed and is controlled by the invisible hand of God. So you have to toss out community, the fact that the early community laid all things at the feet of te Apostles, and there was community ownership of property.

In so doing, you redefine the whole Gospel around the ediface of property rights, profit and the ideal of the 'self made man' (which at one time even considered the possiblity that 'savages' were only one third human and women were less than men, creatures who could be exploited and treated as beasts of burden). St Leo was the first to say that property was theft, that if see the glory of God in nature all about you, you would realize that this goodness was shared equally to all, both Saved and unsaved. And once property is defined as belonging to an upper class, that property was usurped from he original intent of being common property.

Of course we would use diffeent perceptions and ways of definition than what the Apostles in their day used, or how the early Church fathers used those terms. But what of following the Spirit of those early days when the Holy Spirit was fresh and new? We talk of renewal and the way we want to be open to the Holy Spirit, so then why do we follow a different Gospel, a way of doing that isn't even consistent with the early Church fathers and some later Saints? And what of Anglo-Christian socialists of the 19th century who led tremendous revivalist meeting in the poorest sections of London and elsewhere. And then there is the Catholic Worker which is now world wide.

An atheistic and humanistic brand of Socialism took hold of the world, because the mainstream said Adam Smith was the new prophet and his doctrine of profit before people was the new Gospel to supplant that of the early Church and the early Church fathers and even those who founded the Monastic ways to preserve and even point to a more perfect form of life. And even the Church comes to the defense of Adam Smith, so it does not lose it's precious hold on the wealth of nations. Is it no wonder then, a perverted form of socialism came into being with both the Fascists and the Marxist-Leninist? Did not even these fail, because they thinking that such could be accomplished without the renewal of the Holy Spirit at Pentacost? Renewal of society from this perspective ought to be prayed about and re-examined. WE shold re-examine how society has actually been perverted by a twisted sense of what self gain really means to those of us who claim Christ as our Savior and whose followers lived in such a way that no one was needy and in want. In those days, even the pagans exclaimed see how these Christians love one another.

I agree. I have studied the early church fathers in depth and I do not know of one that ever spoke of being rich as a virtue. In fact most of them gave everything they had to the poor (St Antony, St Basil, St Gregor, St John Chrysostom, etc.) I cannot believe I ever thought of capitalism as being "Christian" in any way.