Of Christians and Marxists

This weekend I read Por qué soy marxista y otras confesiones, by Alfons Carles Comín (1933-1980), which Laia publishing house published exactly 47 years ago, in June 1979 (in reality it is a collection of articles, some of which had been published several years earlier). To better adapt to the ideological fashion of that time, the title is misleading. In reality, it should have been called Por qué soy cristiano-marxista, as it literally appears in the first sentence of Comín's essay; the year '79, however, would have been quite problematic: fashions, all of them, generate their corresponding antibodies. Although it is unfindable, I recommend this book. It formulates one of the most nuanced and historically informed approaches to the relationship between Christianity and Marxism in late Francoist Catalonia, and in the European context of the post-Vatican II Council. It should be said that other authors of the same period were neither so well informed nor so nuanced. Comín's approach is born of a double commitment: to the workers' tradition and to Christianity lived as a radical ethical demand. This perspective allows him to read Marxism not as a substitution of faith, but as a historical hermeneutics capable of revealing the structures of oppression that Christianity, in its institutional version, had often ignored or even legitimized. Comín did not precisely come from a working-class family, let alone a Marxist one, but he was Catholic. On page 22 he states that Catalonia has suffered ""an attempt at authentic ethnic genocide". No small matter.

In that politically uncertain and socially turbulent scenario, Comín rejects both institutional Christianity disconnected from social reality and the reductionist Marxism that denies any symbolic or transcendent dimension to human experience. Christianity contains a liberating impulse that is only fully realized when it is embodied in history: the Gospel, according to him, points to a radical transformation of social relations. And Marxism, for its part, offers a supposedly "scientific" analysis of exploitation and a collective praxis aimed at overcoming capitalism. Comín defends a dialectic in which Christianity contributes an anthropology of dignity, a critique of the idolatry of power, and an ethic of fraternity, while Marxism provides a methodology and an organized practice of struggle. The truth is that, put like that, it all sounds very good – too good, perhaps. I emphasize the intellectual honesty of this writing: Comín does not Christianize Marx nor does he "Marxify" Jesus, and he also recognizes three points of inevitable tension. The first and most obvious is the question of transcendence. Orthodox Marxism defines religion as the opium of the people. The second has to do with revolutionary violence. Comín admits the need for social conflict, but rejects the sacralization of violence and defends a praxis that keeps the ethical dimension open. The third point is the role of the Church, an institution historically tied to power, but which can – which "must– become a space for solidarity with the oppressed (with everyone).

What was the objective? To overcome the false alternative between faith and emancipation. His Marxism is critical, not dogmatic; his Christianity is historical and committed, not formalist or rigorist. In a time of depoliticization and crisis of collective narratives, the proposal continues to challenge: there is only Christianity where there is a struggle for justice, and there is only lasting social transformation where human dignity is guaranteed. I insist that all of this seems quite convincing. It only seems so, however... The profound incompatibility between Christianity and Marxism can be reduced to this conceptual barrier: the ultimate source of salvation and meaning cannot be simultaneously transcendent and immanent-historical. Marxism affirms that human liberation comes exclusively from the material transformation of social structures; Christianity, from a transcendence that lies beyond history, which it surpasses. There is a second question, less philosophical, or more earthly, although equally important: that of the enormous contradictions generated in Catalonia by that attempt at hybridization. Some stem from the inertia of those times; others, on the contrary, are unjustifiable and more or less shameful. If you are interested in the topic, I recommend Agustí Pons' excellent essay Catholics, Communists and Co. (Edicions del 1984). No, we were not born yesterday, and although it may seem redundant or trite, it is worth remembering periodically.