Socialism in the Church..!
Socialism in the Church..!
A wonderful image of the life of the first community
Christianity was the first to call for socialist life and to live it. The Church was the first spiritual socialist community, which in the life of the holy fellowship reached an amazing sublimity that no one in the world has yet reached.
Christian socialism was based on two fundamental pillars: asceticism and love—asceticism from the whole heart toward money, possessions, properties, and everything in the world; and love of one’s neighbor from the whole heart, so that a person gives him all that he has and gives even his own soul.
Thus the Book of Acts of the Apostles presented to us a brilliantly beautiful image of the life of fellowship in the early Church, saying: “And all who believed were together, and had all things in common” (Acts 2:45) … “Nor did anyone say that any of the things he possessed was his own, but they had all things in common… Nor was there anyone among them who lacked; for all who were owners of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of the things that were sold, and laid them at the apostles’ feet; and they distributed to each as anyone had need” (Acts 4:32, 34, 35).
There was no rich and poor in the early Church. Concerning the rich, the Scripture says: “Nor did anyone say that any of the things he possessed was his own.” The expression “private pocket” disappeared from the early Church. And concerning the poor, the Scripture says: “Nor was there anyone among them who lacked.”
People did not hoard money; rather, each one took “as anyone had need.”
A wonderful image that no society has reached, and will not reach… because the greatness and depth of this image were in the fact that all this was done out of asceticism and out of love, from the depth of the heart…
The apostles, at whose feet all the money was laid, lived as poor. The money was at their feet, but it was not in their hands nor in their pockets, nor in their treasuries… rather, it was distributed immediately to whoever had need. Thus Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have” (Acts 3:6). And Paul said, “As poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things” (2 Corinthians 6:10). They were conformed to their Lord, who for our sake became poor while He was rich.
Does the Church today live the life of the holy fellowship?
Is the socialism of the apostolic age present now in the Church? Does it exist in our Christian society? And does it exist within the clergy?
I ask. The question may remain without an answer, or it may have an answer, but I am ashamed to record it. Nevertheless, I will present detailed questions that clarify the answer:
There are rich dioceses, and there are poor dioceses. Likewise, there are rich monasteries and poor monasteries. Do the poor receive help from the rich in order to carry out their pastoral care? Or does regional feeling make us forget the common good?!
The same may be said about the city and the village: there are churches in cities that receive huge revenues, while there are churches in villages that need the most basic necessities and cannot find them. Can the city church spend on the needs of the village church? Or does the rich church remain luxuriant in its wealth, adorning and embellishing its buildings every day and completing its decoration and splendor, without caring for the needs of pastoral care in the village??!
Here we ask: what then is the role of the bishop? Is he not the overseer and administrator of all? Every bishop should know well that in his diocese there are two types of churches: churches that bring in great revenue, and churches that need to be spent upon. It is his duty to take from these and give to those, and to keep the economic balance moderate between the two, as a father to both… remembering that we are all “members of one body.”
Yet we find a wide gap between the condition of one priest and another: there are priests who do not find the necessary sustenance, and priests who live in luxury, acquire luxuries, and have properties and institutions!! There is a priest in a church who receives from it more than one hundred pounds monthly, and another priest who receives only a few pennies from his church!! Who is the establisher of justice between the two? Is it not the bishop, the steward of God? So what has the bishop done?!
I say this in pain and in shame, and I wish I could erase what I am saying so that it would not reach the reader’s eyes… I say that the bishop sometimes keeps the situation as it is, not correcting the condition of the destitute church; more than this, he may use it as a place of humiliation, transferring to it the priest with whom he is displeased. The church is transformed from a field of pastoral care into a field of humiliation and displacement, in which the priest feels that he has been removed from his livelihood just as he has been removed from his flock!!
Another serious financial problem is the fate of the priest’s wife and children if he reposes and leaves them without a provider. Has the Church established a financial system to care for these? It has not. Therefore, some priests fell into anxiety over the fate of their children and began to store money, build houses, or resort to other ways to secure their children’s future!! Likewise, the service of the priesthood has become, for some of these reasons and others, a source of anxiety; many fear approaching it, or their wives fear it..!!
If we say this about the priests, then what we say about the service of the deacon and the cantor (the ‘areef) is painful and lengthy to explain…
The bishop in the Church is a father to all—the priests, all the clergy, and the people. All are his children; he must ask about them and be reassured about their livelihood.
Many times—or perhaps always—we look with an individualistic view… Every diocese among us, every monastery, every city, every village, every church is an independent unit standing by itself in its finances, with no relation to others, neither in taking nor in giving!! Where then is fraternal participation? Where is compassion? Where is the life of the holy fellowship?! Why is there no general arrangement that organizes matters, instead of this individual living, as though we are not one body in which, if one member suffers, the rest of the members suffer?!
Finally, I ask: what is the financial system in our Church? And if there is currently no financial system, then when will there be one?! I ask…
Shenouda
Bishop of Theological Institutes and Christian Education
-
An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – Al-Keraza Magazine – Second Year – Tenth Issue, December 1966.
For better translation support, please contact the center.
