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I'm not a scholar in Marxism (good golly, that would be boring!), but from my layman's reading of it, I can at least recognize several things:
1. There is no monolithic Marxism. Marxism as an analytical and philosophical tool has been used in many different ways, and there is
1. There is no monolithic Marxism. Marxism as an analytical and philosophical tool has been used in many different ways, and there is
enough infighting among Marxists that would make Protestant infighting look genteel.
2. Related to #1, you can't conflate Marxism with one of the ways it has been applied and appropriated. Conflating Marxism with communism and Critical Race Theory, for example, is like
2. Related to #1, you can't conflate Marxism with one of the ways it has been applied and appropriated. Conflating Marxism with communism and Critical Race Theory, for example, is like
conflating the Dutch Reformation with apartheid.
3. There are a lot of people who are practical Marxists but not theoretical Marxists. What I mean is that many people who have been disenchanted by a form of Christianity and religion that promotes quietism and the preservation
3. There are a lot of people who are practical Marxists but not theoretical Marxists. What I mean is that many people who have been disenchanted by a form of Christianity and religion that promotes quietism and the preservation
of the status quo of inequalities have turned to Marxist praxis because of its aim toward social justice and change. These people don't need theoretical arguments but Christian practice towards justice as a counter narrative.
4. Marxist analysis, like any tool of common grace,
4. Marxist analysis, like any tool of common grace,
may recognize truths about the world we live in. A denial of Marxism therefore does not equate to the nonexistence of inequalities and injustices on a social and institutional scale. The Bible clearly speaks on these issues, whether or not Marxist analysis can help us see it
in the world around us.
5. There have been and continue to be a strain of Christian Marxists around the world, especially the global south. Yet, their use of Marxism is simply as a response toward oppression and tyranny, not as a wholesale endorsement of a Marxist program.
5. There have been and continue to be a strain of Christian Marxists around the world, especially the global south. Yet, their use of Marxism is simply as a response toward oppression and tyranny, not as a wholesale endorsement of a Marxist program.
We have to be nuanced enough to realize that Marxism in the West is very different in flavor from Marxism in the global south.
6. Marxism was used as a four letter word and associated with ideas like multiracial marriages, integration, and the equality of all people. Just Google
6. Marxism was used as a four letter word and associated with ideas like multiracial marriages, integration, and the equality of all people. Just Google
images of White protesters during the Civil rights era who held signs making that wrongful association. This was basically a McCarthyism of the streets.
7. When someone claims to be a "Marxist," you really have to do your homework to know exactly what they mean. For example,
7. When someone claims to be a "Marxist," you really have to do your homework to know exactly what they mean. For example,
I believe that some associated with BLM consider themselves and their movement as "Marxist." But as I mentioned above, there is no monolithic Marxism, and anyone claiming to be a Marxist now is likely one stripe of many neoMarxists or Marxist-tangential thought. It can simply
mean, as mentioned above, a practical commitment to social change rather than a wholesale theoretical affirmation.
8. If you are going to reject Marxism in all of its forms and influences (ie treat it like a poison in which one drop in anything is lethal), then you must pose
8. If you are going to reject Marxism in all of its forms and influences (ie treat it like a poison in which one drop in anything is lethal), then you must pose
an alternative analytical and philosophical tool to assess and interpret real experiences and facts of the real world of injustice and oppression. You can deny Marxism, but you have to provide an alternative to understanding the phenomena of systemic sin, especially with the way
the Bible speaks of it as a reality of this broken world. You can't be the guy who just goes around telling a near sighted person that their lens prescription is wrong without providing a right prescription to see what's staring them in the face.
9. Unchecked biblicism and
9. Unchecked biblicism and
fundamentalism are as harmful as uncritical uses of Marxist analysis. The reason is because biblicism and fundamentalism often just cloaks positivism as "reading the Bible literally" and takes the pious high ground while using philosophical tools uncritically that ultimately
render the veracity of the Word of God null.
10. If your focus leans more towards challenging Marxism than addressing the brokenness that Marxism is trying to explain, you're doing ministry and Christian living wrong. You must be able to recognize the cause of someone's hurts,
10. If your focus leans more towards challenging Marxism than addressing the brokenness that Marxism is trying to explain, you're doing ministry and Christian living wrong. You must be able to recognize the cause of someone's hurts,
anger, tears, and fears with empathy and not write them off simply because they don't have the right way to talk about these things. Imagine if Jesus dealt with us that way!
