Why the new Pope adopted the name Leo

Speaking to the Conseil d’Etat – the State Council – on 4 March 1806, Napoleon famously said: “I do not see in [religion] the mystery of the incarnation, but the mystery of social order, the association of religion with paradise, an idea of equality which keeps the rich from being massacred by the poor….” More than two centuries later, helping to maintain social order remains the fundamental role of the Church.

Aleteia, an online Catholic news website, informs us that the new Pope’s papal name “places him in the lineage of Pope Leo XIII (1878-1903), considered a founding father of the Church's social doctrine.” The essence of that doctrine was class compromise and collaboration, while at the same time attacking the ideas of Marxism that were growing within the labour movement at the time.

Therefore, if we consider who the previous Pope Leo was and the doctrine he promoted, particularly on the condition of the working class, we will get a better understanding of the role the present Pope Leo hopes to play in the coming period of deepening capitalist crisis, and the intense class struggle which will flow from it.

The crisis facing the Catholic Church

The Catholic Church as an institution has suffered a lot of damage to its reputation since the 1990s, when cases of child sex abuse by members of the clergy began to be widely covered in the media. Bishops were found to have covered up many cases, and John Paul II received criticism from victims of the abuse for being too slow in responding to the problem.

As a result of the scandals, up to one-third of Catholics in the UK stopped or significantly reduced attendance at Mass, and large numbers stopped giving donations. In Latin America, tens of millions have left the Catholic Church to join the Pentecostal Churches, to the point that now nearly one-in-five Latin Americans consider themselves Protestant.

This is a serious problem for the ruling classes in those countries where Catholicism is the dominant religion because the Catholic Church plays an important role in bolstering their rule. The Church needed someone to rebuild its lost authority and win back the confidence that it once held.

This was the task that fell to Pope Francis in 2013. This explains why, back in 2014, he publicly asked for forgiveness for the abuse carried out on children by the Catholic clergy, promising that more severe measures, “sanctions”, would be imposed on the perpetrators.

The Church – an important pillar of the establishment

We have to understand that the capitalist class does not hold on to power solely through the ‘armed bodies of men’ of the repressive state apparatus: the police, the army and the judiciary. It also has at its disposal other pillars, such as the media in its various forms (the press, the TV, social media outlets), as well as the education system and the Church.

All of these are means of maintaining a grip on the consciousness of the mass of ordinary working people. And they are particularly important in times of deep crisis for the system.

The Church ensures that the workers accept their lot in this world with the illusion that they will be rewarded after they die / Image: public domain

We are living through such a crisis today. Millions of people are beginning to question the system, and are looking for an explanation as to why society is in such turmoil, with economic crises, wars and civil wars. A change in consciousness is taking place, which is reflected in a widespread anti-establishment mood. Large layers of the population have lost all respect for what were once respected institutions.

The police, the press, parliament – all important tools in the arsenal of the ruling class – have also had their scandals and crises, which have undermined them in the eyes of the masses.

This is a dangerous situation for the ruling class. When the masses realise that it is the people at the top – the capitalists and their political representatives – who are responsible for the worsening living conditions of the many, they will challenge the long-established right of the ruling class to rule and demand a greater say in how things are run. That means that at a certain point, historically established property rights can be brought into question.

That is where the Church hierarchy can become an important element in attempting to maintain the stability of the system. The Catholic Church claims to have a following of 1.4 billion people, the bulk of whom are evidently ordinary working people.

The role of the Catholic Church as an institution has always been that of mediating the class struggle, of making sure that the downtrodden masses, the millions of workers exploited by the capitalist class, do not challenge the right of the billionaires to own the means of production. Instead, the Church ensures that the workers accept their lot in this world with the illusion that they will be rewarded after they die, in a paradise where everyone is equal and lives without worries or concerns about their future.

In passing, we could say that what they are hoping for is, in fact, a communist heaven, where no one is exploited, where there are no classes, and where everyone lives in peace. The role of the Catholic Church is to promote this illusion. Here in the real world, however, it promotes the rights of property and the right to accumulate wealth, while convincing the poor that no fundamental change to their condition is possible.

The shock of the French Revolution

The Catholic Church was for centuries an instrument of the feudal aristocracy and had long resisted any moves to abolish feudal relations, in part because its role was to defend the ruling classes of the time, and in part because it had become a large landowner itself. Its resistance to the ideas of the Enlightenment was a reflection of its opposition to the scientific thinking which came with the early development of capitalism.

In spite of this, the inevitable rise of the bourgeoisie – the capitalist owners of industry – led to the Reformation, the struggle of the new class against the old Feudal order, reflected in the religious struggle between Protestantism and Catholicism. In consequence, the Reformation saw the elimination of the Catholic Church across a large part of Western Europe, as it was replaced by the Protestant churches. Even where it managed to survive, its influence was weakened.

In spite of this, over the centuries, the Catholic church acquired vast feudal estates. In the case of the Papal State, it governed directly over a large part of central Italy, with the Pope being in effect a monarch. In France, as well as owning six percent of the land, the Church also had the right to collect the tithe, worth around ten percent of all agricultural produce. And on all this wealth, the Church paid no taxes.

The Catholic hierarchy, however, faced a serious challenge during the French Revolution. It stood against the revolution and therefore lost a lot of property and influence in the country. Between 1789 and 1794, the peak of the revolution, the Catholic Church faced the wrath of the revolutionary masses. Churches and religious orders were closed down and Catholic worship was suppressed.

Napoleon had a very pragmatic view of the role of religion / Image: public domain

One of the factors that led to the French Revolution was the bankruptcy of the state. Someone had to pay for the huge public debt. The landed, feudal aristocracy and the wealthy clergy refused to pay. That explains why, in August 1789, the tithe was taken away from the Church, and all Church property was nationalised.

However, once the back of the feudal aristocracy had been broken, and the bourgeoisie had been established as the new ruling class, it had no desire to maintain the revolutionary fervour of the early years. It proceeded to consolidate its grip on power by leaning precisely on the conservative nobles and priests left over from the Ancien Régime. This was overseen by Napoleon, who came to power in 1799.

His role was to put an end to the ‘excesses’ of the early days of the revolution while at the same time consolidating the power of the bourgeoisie. His aim was not to destroy the Church but to transform it into a tool of the new bourgeois state. He saw in the Church – albeit under the strict control of the French state – a useful aid in consolidating the new bourgeois power and pushing the masses back into a subservient position. Just as it had been useful to the old feudal aristocracy, it could now be reshaped into a useful tool for the rule of the bourgeoisie.

Napoleon had a very pragmatic view of the role of religion. He understood it was an instrument for maintaining social stability, and therefore saw that the Church had to be enrolled in the service of the new order.

In 1800, Napoleon expressed his thinking before a gathering of priests in Milan: “No society can exist without morality, and there is no good morality without religion. Therefore, only religion gives the State firm and lasting support.”

The 19th century was thus to see a revival of the fortunes of the Catholic Church in France, as it made its peace with the new, bourgeois, ruling class and prepared to serve its needs.

The Catholic Church could not stop the inexorable advance of history, and it was eventually forced to come to terms with, and adapt to, the new class relations. It could do this because, after all, capitalism is still a system based on the class division of society, of a minority of wealthy people at the top exploiting a mass of working people below.

Today, the Catholic Church openly defends the capitalist ruling classes across the globe. It not only upholds the capitalist system in words, but it has accumulated enormous wealth – calculated in the trillions of dollars – in the form of real estate holdings and investments. It has therefore become an integral part of the capitalist system and has a direct interest in holding back the class struggle.

The rise of the working class and the influence of Marxism

What began to seriously challenge the position of the Catholic Church, together with that of the other main Christian Churches, was the emergence of the industrial proletariat under modern capitalism.

The Industrial Revolution in Britain, from roughly the mid-1700s to the mid-1800s, produced a radical transformation of society. The emergence of this new social class threatened the very basis of capitalist society, for the mass of workers had the power to form their own organisations, the trade unions, and their own political parties. Most importantly, they envisaged a different way of running society, one without private property in the means of production and without classes.

By the end of the 19th century in Britain, the working class had become a major force. With this came the rise of the trade unions, which led to the emergence of the TUC (Trades Union Congress) in 1868. Germany after 1871 saw a massive development of its industry and, with this, a powerful labour movement. This process was gradually repeated across many European countries. France began to see a similar, although delayed, process, particularly after the 1850s. Italy saw the beginnings of industrial development in the 1880s, especially in the Milan-Turin-Genoa “industrial triangle”.

Once established in a few key countries, capitalism began to spread its tentacles across the globe. Marx and Engels explained this in the Communist Manifesto:

“The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the entire surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere. (...)

“The bourgeoisie… compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilisation into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image.”

In the midst of this industrial development – with the industrial proletariat expanding and developing new mass organisations – emerged the figures of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, who were able to give a conscious expression of the needs of the working class. The powerful Chartist Movement in Britain in the 1830s and 1840s had revealed the revolutionary potential of the working class, and a few decades later in France, the Paris Commune in 1871 - although defeated and brutally repressed - showed that the working class could actually take power.

In Germany, the Social Democratic Workers' Party was set up in 1875 as an avowedly Marxist party. Within two years, in the 1877 Reichstag elections, the party won more than 500,000 votes and 13 deputies. By 1912, it had grown to more than a million members and was the largest parliamentary group in the Reichstag.

On the back of these huge successes in Germany, the Second International was founded at a congress in Paris in 1889. It was at that congress that May Day (1 May) was declared International Workers’ Day. The new International also began a campaign for the 8-hour day. Friedrich Engels was elected as honorary president of the International in 1893 and was one of its main theoreticians, together with figures such as Kautsky and Plekhanov, and, later, Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg.

It had sections in many countries, and, in the period immediately after its foundation, more and more sections joined from all over the world. In France, several groups adhered to the Second International and were later fused into one party to become the SFIO. In Italy, its section would become known as the PSI, the Italian Socialist Party. Both of these would go on to become the main party of the working class in France and Italy.

The ideas of Marxism had now been transformed into a mass force in many countries. These ideas – including the labour theory of value, which led inevitably to the conclusion that capitalism must be overthrown, and on the origins of society, the family and the early “primitive communism” of humanity – all represented a serious challenge to the established ideas of the ruling classes, and with them the teachings of the Church.

The right to private property of the means of production, the source of the profits, wealth and privileges of the capitalist class, was now being openly challenged. Therefore, the ideas of the socialists could no longer be ignored and had to be taken seriously. It was no longer possible to simply preach humility and acceptance of one’s lot in this world in exchange for an eternal life in paradise. The Church had to be seen as tackling the real, immediate problems facing the working class in this world.

Pope Leo XIII – the so-called “workers’ Pope”

The Catholic Church had previously discouraged Catholic workers from joining trade unions and the socialist parties. But the inexorable rise of the labour movement meant that this was no longer tenable. Workers were fighting for their rights, for better wages, a shorter working day, higher living standards and a better life in general. The Catholic hierarchy had no answers to the questions being posed by the workers, while the socialist parties had a very clear message that the workers could identify with.

It was Leo XIII who realised that the issues facing the working class needed to be addressed by the Church if it was to continue to maintain its authority / Image: public domain

It was Leo XIII who realised that the issues facing the working class needed to be addressed by the Church if it was to continue to maintain its authority among the millions of Catholic workers. Simply to stand in opposition to the socialist organisations and movements that had emerged would only serve to further alienate its own followers.

Pope Pius IX, in his 1864 Syllabus of Errors encyclical, had already listed both “socialism and communism” among a number of “condemned propositions”. Following on from this, Leo XIII issued his Quod apostolici muneris encyclical in 1878, which explicitly opposed “socialism, communism and nihilism”. The encyclical maintained that, "the right of property and of ownership, which springs from nature itself, must not be touched and stands inviolate.”

By 1891, it had, however, become clear that it was not enough to merely condemn socialism and communism. The Church had to offer some kind of an alternative to the ideas of Marxism, which were having a huge impact on the organised working class across Europe.

Pope Leo XIII’s response was therefore his Rerum Novarum encyclical - on the Rights and Duties of Capital and Labour - issued that year, just two years after the founding congress of the Socialist International. Rerum Novarum stressed the need to improve the condition of the working class, and it used quite radical-sounding language:

“Some opportune remedy must be found quickly for the misery and wretchedness pressing so unjustly on the majority of the working class… by degrees it has come to pass that working men have been surrendered, isolated and helpless, to the hardheartedness of employers and the greed of unchecked competition… [T]he hiring of labour and the conduct of trade are concentrated in the hands of comparatively few; so that a small number of very rich men have been able to lay upon the teeming masses of the labouring poor a yoke little better than that of slavery itself.”

Leo XIII vividly depicts the plight of the working class in the 19th century. He actually supports the right of workers to form unions and to participate in collective bargaining. He states that, “… wages ought not to be insufficient to support a frugal and well-behaved wage-earner.”

He explicitly attacks the Socialists, however, for, “working on the poor man's envy of the rich,” and for “striving to do away with private property”, and he insists they are wasting their time in trying to combat inequality:

“Socialists may in that intent do their utmost, but all striving against nature is in vain. There naturally exist among mankind manifold differences of the most important kind; people differ in capacity, skill, health, strength; and unequal fortune is a necessary result of unequal condition. Such unequality is far from being disadvantageous either to individuals or to the community.”

He stresses the fact that it is the destiny of humanity to suffer in this world:

“...the other pains and hardships of life will have no end or cessation on earth; for the consequences of sin are bitter and hard to bear, and they must accompany man so long as life lasts. To suffer and to endure, therefore, is the lot of humanity; let them strive as they may, no strength and no artifice will ever succeed in banishing from human life the ills and troubles which beset it.”

He insists that the classes should not be in conflict with each other but that they should cooperate:

“The great mistake made in regard to the matter now under consideration is to take up with the notion that class is naturally hostile to class, and that the wealthy and the working men are intended by nature to live in mutual conflict.”

In fact, he appeals to the proletariat to respect the property of the bosses, and to the bosses to respect the workers:

“Of these duties, the following bind the proletarian and the worker: fully and faithfully to perform the work which has been freely and equitably agreed upon; never to injure the property, nor to outrage the person, of an employer; never to resort to violence in defending their own cause, nor to engage in riot or disorder; and to have nothing to do with men of evil principles, who work upon the people with artful promises of great results, and excite foolish hopes which usually end in useless regrets and grievous loss. The following duties bind the wealthy owner and the employer: not to look upon their work people as their bondsmen, but to respect in every man his dignity as a person ennobled by Christian character.”

He was basically appealing to the capitalists to make some concessions to the working class in terms of wages and conditions:

“...the employer must never tax his work people beyond their strength, or employ them in work unsuited to their sex and age. His great and principal duty is to give every one what is just.”

The purpose of such appeals was an attempt to stabilise bourgeois society: to maintain the profit motive, but to eliminate the class struggle that inevitably flows from it.

Marx and Engels in the Communist Manifesto had already anticipated this kind of thinking when they stated,

“A part of the bourgeoisie is desirous of redressing social grievances in order to secure the continued existence of bourgeois society. (...)

“The socialistic bourgeois want all the advantages of modern social conditions without the struggles and dangers necessarily resulting therefrom. They desire the existing state of society, minus its revolutionary and disintegrating elements.”

Pope Leo XIII was clearly thinking along the same lines.

The Church had understood for some time that in order to blunt the class struggle, it had to become part of it. We thus see in this same period the first Christian trade unions in France (1887) and Germany (in the 1870s). In Italy in 1918, in the midst of a revolutionary upsurge of the class struggle, the Confederazione Italiana dei Lavoratori (CIL), a Catholic trade union federation in direct competition with the Socialist Party-led CGL, was set up.

The United States saw a similar process, where Irish Catholic trade union leaders came to play important roles in combating the influence of the Communists. In 1919, in the midst of rising class struggle in the United States, US Catholic bishops adopted the Program for Social Reconstruction, which followed the guidelines established by Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum.

All these unions were set up to consciously cut across the influence of the socialists and communists, and thereby also divide the labour movement. This involved appearing to be working for social justice, improved working conditions and fair wages, even calling strikes, while at the same time emphasising cooperation between capital and labour, and defending private property.

Thomas Aquinas to the rescue of the propertied classes

The defence of private property had become the central goal of the Church, as the call for the expropriation of capital had become the pivotal demand of the Marxists. Thus, while calling for some alleviation of the conditions of the working class, Leo XIII came down strongly in defence of private property. In doing so, he quoted Thomas Aquinas, the 13th century Catholic scholar, who, in his famous Summa Theologica, elaborated on the question of private property, among other things.

Aquinas’s teachings were, however, in contradiction with the doctrine of the early Christians. There is a long list of early Christian saints and writers who openly and vehemently condemned the very concept of private property. St. Cyprian of the 3rd century stated, “We must avoid all property, as we should avoid an enemy…”. Lactantius wrote that, “God in his infinite wisdom and charity… gave this earth to all men to have and to hold it in common, in order that all men could live a life of true communion…”

St. John Chrysostom went even further when he referred to a society based on common ownership:

“… such a social structure founded upon the possession of all goods in common promotes peace and security through the elimination of man’s motives for class conflicts. But as soon as someone tries to appropriate a thing to himself by making it his private property, strife begins… wherever this ‘mine and thyne’ is unknown, there exists no struggle or strife. From all this should follow that the community of possession is a more appropriate form of life than private property.”

There are many more such quotes we could provide from the early period of the Catholic Church. Suffice it to say that all these statements condemning the evils of private property reflected the communistic mode of living of the early Christian communities. As the Acts of the Apostles state clearly: “All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had.” (Acts 4:32-35)

Aquinas’s teachings were in contradiction with the doctrine of the early Christians / Image: public domain

This teaching was clearly in total contradiction with the real property relations that existed both in the Roman Empire and the feudal system that followed. In both cases, powerful owners of property, in the form of the Roman slaveowners and feudal landlords, were the ruling class.

A religion that condemned these as evil individuals could not serve the needs of the propertied class. This explains why, once Christianity had become the official religion of the Roman Empire, the teachings of the Catholic Church on property rights had to change. Thus, the right to own private property gradually became accepted and justified by the Church itself.

St. Augustine had begun to tackle this question in the 4th century, and Thomas Aquinas built on this. He fused together the earlier thinking, based on what he referred to as “ius naturale”, natural law – which embodied the concept of common ownership – with “ius gentium”, a later human addition to the former, “devised by human reason for the benefit of human life” which meant that it was now “…lawful for man to possess property.”

He added that, “…this [private property] is necessary to human life (…) because every man is more careful to procure what is for him alone than that which is common to many or to all…” and a “…more peaceful state is ensured to man if each one is contented with his own. Hence it is to be observed that quarrels arise more frequently where there is no division of the things possessed.”

This has been the classical argument in defence of private property to this day, i.e. that it is the only way an economy can work, and the only way you can get people to work efficiently. Unable to ignore the writers quoted earlier, Aquinas squares the circle by stating that “…man ought to possess external things, not as his own, but as common, so that... he is ready to communicate them to others in their need..."

Thiago Magalhães, visiting professor at the Faculty of Philosophy of the Monastery of Saint Benedict-SP (Brazil), summed up Aquinas’s writings on property, “...the fact that the community of goods is attributed to natural law does not prevent the division of possessions from being institutionalized by positive law.” (Natural Law Change by Addition, Original Sin and Ius Gentium: Thomas Aquinas’s Theory of Property as a Pillar of Catholic Social Teaching, 2025)

Thus, while in theory a reference is made to the earlier thinking, in practice men are now allowed to possess property as their own… as long as they are prepared to make charitable donations to people in need. It is worth noting here that the early Christians considered common property something natural, but later the Church would turn this idea on its head, claiming that it was private property that was natural!

Following on in this tradition, as we have seen, Leo XIII attacked the socialists of the 19th century, insisting that “the main tenet of socialism, the community of goods, must be utterly rejected,” and adding that equality was an unattainable goal.

His aim was to achieve some kind of social harmony without doing away with the root cause of the disharmony in society, i.e. the private appropriation by the capitalists of the surplus value produced by the workers. His idea was that of class collaboration, with both sides, workers and employers, having duties and rights. The employers have the right to own their property – and profit from it – while having the duty of guaranteeing reasonable wages for the workers. The workers have the right to minimum conditions, but the duty to work hard for their employers.

The papacy prepares for future class struggle

Another article in Aleteia, Pope Leo XIV and the New Industrial Revolution (8 May 2025), is worth quoting at length, as it clearly indicates that the new Pope sees his role as being similar to that of Leo XIII:

“Just as Leo XIII responded to the harsh realities of the 19th-century Industrial Revolution with his landmark encyclical Rerum Novarum in 1891, Pope Leo XIV seems poised to address the moral dilemmas of our current technological revolution. (...)

“Today, the world faces another profound technological shift. Artificial intelligence promises unprecedented efficiency and productivity, but also threatens to upend traditional forms of work. Much like the steam engines and power looms of the 19th century, AI has the potential to redefine labour, eliminate jobs, and deepen economic inequalities if left unchecked.

“Matteo Bruni, the director of the Holy See Press Office, explained that Pope Leo XIV chose his papal name as a nod to workers ‘in the era of artificial intelligence.’ (...)

“Just as Leo XIII championed the rights of factory workers and artisans, his 21st-century successor may soon advocate for the rights of digital workers, gig economy labourers, and those displaced by automation.” [Emphasis in the original]

The present Pope is also following in the footsteps of his immediate predecessor, Pope Francis, and his goal is the same: to re-establish the authority of the Catholic Church over the millions of workers who still adhere to it, in order to be better able to hold back the class struggle.

Some have referred to the present Pope’s stance as a ‘third way’ that defends private property while at the same time defending social justice, the dignity of workers, just wages and workers’ rights in the tradition of Leo XIII.

All this is going to further strengthen the illusions among the reformist left that the new Pope can be an ally in the class struggle. Pope Leo’s predecessor, Francis, would often speak out in defence of the poor and against “unbridled capitalism”. He called for peace in Ukraine, for a ceasefire in Gaza, and so on. We can expect similar statements from the new Pope.

The American Prospect, a US liberal magazine, published an interesting article, A Working-Class Pope (May 12, 2025) which states that, “By his deeds, and by choosing the name of the last Pope Leo, the new pope’s Catholicism appears Christian – and even social – democratic.” The article concludes, “In this time of immense economic inequality, America could use an American working-class pope. We may just have got one.”

We can see here how attempts are being made to cultivate an image of the new Pope as being worker-friendly, just as the previous Leo was seen as the "Social Pope" and the "Pope of the Workers”.

The illusions of the reformist left

All this has led some on the reformist left to express real illusions that somehow the Pope stands for a progressive agenda, that he is “on our side”. But this ignores the essentially reactionary nature of the Catholic Church and its hierarchy of cardinals and bishops.

After the death of Pope Francis, there was an outpouring of praise for the man by some on the left / Image: ProtoplasmaKid, Wikimedia Commons

By defending the property rights of the capitalist class, the papacy defends the very system that is responsible for the wars in Ukraine, Gaza, and now Iran. Capitalism without war is inconceivable. War is the natural progression of ‘peaceful’ competition in the world market. One cannot defend capitalist property relations and at the same time claim to be for a just world.

After the death of Pope Francis, there was an outpouring of praise for the man by some on the left. La France Insoumise MP Eric Coquerel stated that the Pope, “…was on the side of the underprivileged…” Jeremy Corbyn stated that, “Pope Francis dedicated his life to the marginalised, displaced and dispossessed. A rare voice for humanity...” Bernie Sanders commented that Francis, “always spoke out for the poor and disenfranchised and injected the need for morality into the global economy.” Maurizio Acerbo, the present leader of a supposedly Communist organisation, Rifondazione Comunista, in Italy, went even further, and wrote an article titled, “Pope Francis, a man of peace and justice. We felt he was a comrade”.

No doubt we can expect more such comments in the future when the new Pope comes out with statements about social justice and so on. Instead of exposing the real reactionary nature of the Catholic Church, instead of bringing out the real class interests it defends, these reformists sow illusions.

There is nothing to be surprised about here. The thinking of these reformists is actually very similar to that of the Catholic hierarchy, although they arrive at their conclusions from a different standpoint. The Church consciously defends the interests of the propertied classes by seeking to pull workers away from militant class action, while pleading with the capitalists for a more humane capitalism. The reformists, although they express their desire to defend the interests of the working class, do not believe that a revolutionary struggle for the overthrow of capitalism is possible, and therefore they seek some way of ameliorating the conditions of the workers, but without challenging the property rights of the capitalist class. The end result is very similar, and that explains why these reformists often end up lining up with the Pope on a number of questions.

Compare the words of all these reformists to those of a genuine Italian Communist, Antonio Gramsci:

“The Vatican is an international enemy of the revolutionary proletariat. It is clear that the Italian working class must resolve the problem of the papacy in large part with its own hands. But it is equally clear that this goal cannot be achieved unless the international proletariat also rises to the occasion.” (The Vatican, Antonio Gramsci 1924)

It goes without saying that communists respect the religious opinions of the mass of downtrodden workers and poor. Whether a worker is a Catholic, a Protestant, a Muslim or a Jew, that is not the key question. We strive to unite the working class on the real concrete, material questions that affect the whole class.

At the same time, however, we do not sow illusions in the role the Church hierarchy plays. There are also many cases of priests in poor neighbourhoods siding with the downtrodden, and who in times of revolutionary upheaval end up on the right side of the barricade, with the working class. But this brings them into conflict with the Church hierarchy. That is why the very same hierarchy is extremely careful to keep this within acceptable limits.

The new Pope has proudly stated that he is an Augustinian. He was, in fact, the prior general of the Order of Saint Augustine (2001–‍2013) and the first Augustinian to become Pope. Saint Augustine was of the opinion that it is in the natural order of things that “men should bear rule over women”, that marriage cannot be undone and therefore divorce is a sinful act. He went even further by stating that sexual intercourse within a marriage is fine if it is for “begetting” children, but sinful if it is merely to satisfy sexual desire.

Not much has changed since the days of St. Augustine. To this day, the Catholic Church – and the present pope – is opposed to divorce, the use of contraception, and abortion and still maintains that sex must involve the risk, at least, of pregnancy, while same-sex relations are considered “sinful”. So not only does the Church play a reactionary role in defence of private property and in terms of the class struggle, it also has an extremely reactionary position on some very basic democratic rights.

Those left leaders, such as Corbyn, Sanders, and all the others, who pour praise on the papacy should reflect on this fact.

The concerns of the ruling classes

In times of deep crisis, the intelligent and more farsighted thinkers within the ruling class look to the future with foreboding. They can see the growing contradictions in the system, especially the social polarisation, with extreme wealth at one end and growing poverty at the other, together with the enormous debt levels that impose a policy of austerity on all governments. They can see what unbearable pressure all this will mean for the working class.

The workers can and will overcome the efforts of the clergy to hold back the tide of history / Image: public domain

Martin Wolf, the chief economic commentator at the Financial Times, is an example of such a thinker. He upholds the capitalist system, “...an economy in which markets, competition, private economic initiative, and private property play central roles.” However, he also fears that the “huge increase in the inequality of people’s condition… erodes the ability of the mass of citizens to feel part of a shared political project.”

He understands that increased economic insecurity has undermined the mainstream parties, and this explains the rise of left and right-wing populism, as he sees it. To cut across this process, he argues that what is needed to restore faith in capitalism is some kind of latter-day version of the New Deal.

He fears that the conditions of capitalist crisis can lead to an undermining of the system itself. Therefore, some way must be found to satisfy both the basic needs of the workers and profitability for the capitalists. This is an irresolvable contradiction under capitalism.

The people at the top cannot remove this contradiction, and that is why they need institutions with authority that can at least appear to be taking up the problems of the working class and promising a better future, while at the same time holding back the class struggle. That is where the “working-class Pope” can play a role.

In Tsarist Russia, the Orthodox Church attempted to mediate class struggle. It provided some limited social welfare for the poorest layers of society, while at the same time legitimising the Tsarist social order - the Tsar being presented as governing through divine right - and discouraging open expressions of class struggle.

History shows that if there is a revolutionary leadership of the working class – such as that provided by the Bolshevik Party in Russia in 1917 – the efforts of the clergy to drag the workers down the path of class collaboration and compromise will fail. During the Russian Revolution, in spite of the fact that millions of workers and peasants adhered to the Orthodox Church, the working class turned to the only party with a real answer to their problems: the Bolshevik Party, which called for the expropriation of the landlords and the capitalists.

The workers can and will overcome the efforts of the clergy to hold back the tide of history. Our task as Communists is to patiently explain the role of the Church hierarchy and to offer a perspective of revolutionary class struggle, one which includes exposing the role of the “workers’ Pope”.