Читать книгу The Christian Left - Anthony A. J. Williams - Страница 13

It was F.D. Maurice, Charles Kingsley and John Ludlow who provided the theological grounding for the Christian Socialist vision, expounding the universal Fatherhood of God and the consequent brotherhood of all people, as well as asserting co-operation to be the natural outworking of these spiritual truths. The next generation of church socialists expanded this political theology into a recognisably socialist or social democratic vision of a whole society characterised by equality, co-operation and democracy.¹²⁷ Unlike European socialism, which, following Marx and Engels, remained largely opposed to religion as a reactionary force and a form of false consciousness, this Christian Socialist vision also had adherents in the Labour Party: James Keir Hardie, George Lansbury, John Wheatley and others. After two unsuccessful terms in office the Labour Party, guided by figures such as William Temple and R.H. Tawney, finally succeeded in translating this vision into a programme of real social and economic change.