Marxism and Christianity; The Vatican and the Left; Reply by Carl Marzani

Abstract

In his otherwise excellent review of Arthur McGovern's Marxism: An American Christian Perspective (MR, June 1984), Joel Kovel comments: "Anyone who, 30 years ago, would have claimed that even a tactical rapprochement could be conceived between forces of Christianity and Marxism would have been dismissed as a dreamer. And to raise the question of a synthesis between the two would have risked the judgment of insanity." I am not certain what Kovel is suggesting here. If he is suggesting that there was a highly developed Christian-Marxist dialogue before 1950 but that those who participated in it were often dismissed as dreamers or insane, I agree with him. (That is still true today in many circles.) However, if he is suggesting that Christian-Marxist dialogue was almost unthinkable (therefore, not done extensively) before 1950, I would have to disagree.

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