Christianity Conforms More To Communism Than To Capitalism

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HammerStone

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One minute you're a Communist, the next a Socialist. Pick one already.

Again, how many mulligans are required for Communism? Everyone that attempted that path has failed, miserably or at least to the point that the government has to be changed. At what point do we finally acknowledge that an ideal written down on paper by a guy who saw his ideals fail is nothing more than a giant failure? I'm not one to equate government systems of the world with God, but for all its failures Capitalism has far outlived Communism in every sense of the word. You want to argue that America was ever a truly Capitalist system? That's a joke. I suppose your life experiences haven't taught you this quite yet, so just remember this lesson in the future that there is a difference between idealism and reality, much as one attempts to deny it. Communism has failed because it's inherently flawed. You cannot have ideal Communism, it simply won't work.

As well, with all due respect, you chide Jerry for making a joke about treatment for your Tinnitus but then defend the likes of Castro who has been proven to have tortured and killed under his watch? I'm not sure the priorities are 100% straight here...
 

Brother Mike

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Wakka, where are you from?

I also did not find comments about your condition very amusing. I may, may not agree with someone, but no matter how strange someone's beliefs are, Pain and suffering are still pain and suffering, and Our Lord Jesus healed all those that were sick and oppressed of the devil, Without finding out what they believed first.

Jesus Is Lord.
 

Foreigner

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I think it is best I give you some backfill on me so you realize that of the two of us, I am the only one who can speak with any type of experience.

I was stationed in Berlin, Germany before the Wall came down and visited East Berlin on several occasions. While there in 1987 one of our units was doing a training run along the southern part of the Wall.
Two people tried to escape near where we were running. Both made it over the Wall. One was shot before they made the canal. One had several shots fired at him that missed. He popped up on our bank of the canal and jumped into the middle of our formation. They held/carried him while they ran on. Looking back we saw the other person being dragged away.

Quite the 'Worker's Paradise' huh?

In 1993 I graduated from the Defense Langauge Institute in Monterey, CA having been certified as a Russian Linguist and returned to Germany to work as something called a Strategic Debriefer.

There my job was to interview people from the former Soviet Union and former Warsaw Pact wishing to receive either refugee status in Germany or Political Asylum in the U.S.

I interviewed these people and they did NOT like living under that system. They had people imprisoned in Gulags for handing out religious literature, protesting the Soviets being if Afghanistan, attempting to or assisting someone leave the country, even receiving foreign publications in the mail from 'the West' etc.

They talked about how atrocious medical care was. Chronic medicine and doctor shortages. (Doctors were paid on the level of a factory worker and alcoholism was very high among their profession.)
Waiting for days in a doctor's office or hospital emergency room. Let me repeat that: DAYS. A number of them died of complications while waiting.

Someone sold you a bill of goods and you swallowed it hook, line, and sinker
.




Foreigner -- Actually, it only works in theory. When it has been tried in the real world it has been a dismal failure...every single time.

Wakka -- No, it works in Cuba, and it worked in the GDR and USSR till the mid-80's. The USSR wasn't socialist when it collapsed, it was deliberately destroyed by Gorbachev's economic reforms.


Reply:
You need to read about the East German STASI (secret police) and what they did to the citizens of the GDR. Assassinations, imprisonments, spying. It began well before 'the mid-80s' and is obviously another large blank spot on your fact sheet.
Worked in Cuba? Not for the political prisoners who were imprisoned and tortured under Castro. Not for the hundreds of thousands who either fled to Florida, drown while attempting to, or were captured and imprisoned or shot for attempting to.
These are simply historical facts. You chosing to ignore them does not negate them.

-------------------------------------------

Foreigner -- Something someone has never personally experienced (like communism) but has only heard good things about always finds it 'readily popular. But when they try it and reality sets in, grief and regret quickly follow.



Wakka -- The people of Cuba are overwhelmingly supportive of their revolution. When given a chance to state their opinion, the Soviet people voted to preserve the USSR in 1991.

REPLY: Again, close but no cigar. They were 'overwhelmingly supportive' until the realized what Castro was putting in place was just as bad if not worse than Batista. Then when the unjustified imprisonments, torture, firing squads, and corruption began in earnest again under Castro, they began to protest. Those who protested were imprisoned or shot and that caused people by the thousands to begin fleeing the island.
-----------------------------------


Foreigner -- Oh, so close. Actually, you should have said, 'where the ONLY party is the Communist Party.'
You ignore the fact that in countries where the only party allowed was the Communist Party, they still couldn't make it work. When you are the only game in town, you get to make all the rules, and you control every facet of society...but still can't make it work, that should be a really big red flag for you (no pun intended).



Wakka -- Again, how did it not work?

REPLY:
Millions in the gulags over the years for simply voice an opinion or wanting to leave the country.
A country in shambles with poor education and even poorer health care.
Widespread corruption and population abuse.
How DID it work?
-----------------------------------


Foreigner -- Actually, the difference is telling people they are going to live in THIS house whether they like it or not. And this house has a leaky roof, a rotted floor, broken windows, and an empty fridge.


Wakka -- None of this applied to the Warsaw Pact countries. Neither does it apply to Cuba.

REPLY: Yes it did apply to the Warsaw Pact nations. Hundreds of personal interviews I have done with people from Bulgaria, GDR, Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, etc. saw you are not only wrong, but incredibly wrong. Have you ever spoken with someone who lived there during the time of Communism? If not, well...
-----------------------------------



Foreigner -- Every single country that tried to be Communist tried very hard to 'represent the ideals of Marxism and Communism.' The problem is that those 'ideals' are not realistic.
You are basically saying that the reason Communism failed in the past is because they just didn't know how to run their unicorn farm. Problem is, there is no such thing as a unicorn.
Wise up.



Wakka -- It worked until Gorbachev betrayed Marxism and Communism. It started to slowly crumble when Khrushchev began to deviate from Marxism and Communism.

REPLY: No, it did not 'work until Gorbachev betrayed..." It was folding like an accordion. He should be credited with giving the crumbling building a soft landing. Are you really this ignorant of actual history?
Are you reading ANYTHING that is not first handed to you by a group that supports Communism?
--------------------------------------------


Foreigner -- And therein lies your problem. In order for your utopia to work, every single solitary person must be willing to do the job that is best for everyone, accept the compensation that is best for everyone, consume only what is best for everyone, and willingly and repeatedly sacrifice so that everyone can have the same thing. This without any accountability or enforcement or punishment for those who do not wish to live as a drone. (Insert 'Twilight Zone' theme here...)



Wakka -- Actually no. Manual labor will be mostly abolished in communism.

REPLY: Again, I laughed outloud when I read this. Many farms had minimal equipment. People still worked the fields. Every fall at harvest time they would cancel school and bring in students and military personnel by the hundreds of thousands across the nation to harvest by hand because they did not have the equipment to do it.
Massive coal mines didn't have simple mining equipment and men with picks were still doing the majority of the work.
Even in Moscow, St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), Smolensk, Orel, Minsk, etc. they had manual labor to sweep the streets, remove snow, etc. because the gov't didn't have the infrastructure.
Again, these are simple, easily confirmable facts. You either simply did not know or are chosing to ignore.
------------------------------------

Communist production takes place in order to satisfy needs. People have a need for disposable time. If you look at the history of socialist states, you'll see that they constantly lowered the amount of hours the people had to work. In the GDR, miners and similarly hard working people had to work only 4 hours a day. Communism will logically extrapolate that trend, and work will become something that people do because they want to, because they feel like it. At least manual labor will stop being a necessity.

REPLY: Again, you do not know fact. You have only partial information.
Mines, factories, etc. has quotas. The people in these factories met the quotas but chose not to exceed them. Why? Because if they did, the quota for the next month would be even higher and they would be in trouble if they didn't meet it. If they met it, it would be even higher the next month.

Many factories literally had a flurry of work the first part of the day and then people sat around getting drunk the rest of the day because they had to remain there.

There is a book calld "MIG Pilot" about Victor Belenko who defected by flying his MIG to Japan in the 70s.
What he detailed and proven accurate after the Communism fell would turn your stomach....................................if you were actually interested in knowing the facts.
 

Wakka

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I think it is best I give you some backfill on me so you realize that of the two of us, I am the only one who can speak with any type of experience.

I was stationed in Berlin, Germany before the Wall came down and visited East Berlin on several occasions. While there in 1987 one of our units was doing a training run along the southern part of the Wall.
Two people tried to escape near where we were running. Both made it over the Wall. One was shot before they made the canal. One had several shots fired at him that missed. He popped up on our bank of the canal and jumped into the middle of our formation. They held/carried him while they ran on. Looking back we saw the other person being dragged away.

Quite the 'Worker's Paradise' huh?

In 1993 I graduated from the Defense Langauge Institute in Monterey, CA having been certified as a Russian Linguist and returned to Germany to work as something called a Strategic Debriefer.

There my job was to interview people from the former Soviet Union and former Warsaw Pact wishing to receive either refugee status in Germany or Political Asylum in the U.S.

I interviewed these people and they did NOT like living under that system. They had people imprisoned in Gulags for handing out religious literature, protesting the Soviets being if Afghanistan, attempting to or assisting someone leave the country, even receiving foreign publications in the mail from 'the West' etc.

They talked about how atrocious medical care was. Chronic medicine and doctor shortages. (Doctors were paid on the level of a factory worker and alcoholism was very high among their profession.)
Waiting for days in a doctor's office or hospital emergency room. Let me repeat that: DAYS. A number of them died of complications while waiting.

Someone sold you a bill of goods and you swallowed it hook, line, and sinker
.

Speaking on behalf of myself and my family. I was born in the Soviet Union before the collapse and remember very little what so ever. However, my parents, friends, and relatives all were born and raised in the Soviet Union. They did not work as slaves as you might think. Good, honest, hard working people were content with life in the Soviet Union. Most people did NOT want the Soviet Union to collapse. They wanted improvements to the Soviet Union, but never the collapse. And what Yeltsin did was was something that a lot of people don't forgive him for. To be honest, my family suffered more AFTER the collapse than before. Before there were social safety nets, there was always employment, and people were generally honest. I'm not going to reject the fact that there were corrupt bureaucrats, however, I strongly believe that civilization was better for most people before the collapse than after.

After the collapse, a lot of honest hard working people, the same people that helped build up the Soviet Union, people like engineers and teachers are now living on the streets because their pensions don't cover the cost of actually living.


Millions in the gulags over the years for simply voice an opinion or wanting to leave the country.
A country in shambles with poor education and even poorer health care.
Widespread corruption and population abuse.
How DID it work?

The health care was far from poor. It was perhaps adequate at best. I was born three months premature and I was kept alive by the health care. At no cost to my parents as it was provided by the state. If this was the United States, my parents would probably still be paying the medical bills. As for education, education was some of the best in the world. I don't know where you get the notion that education was poor. Moscow University and the People's Friendship University of Moscow are considered some of the most prestigious universities.


REPLY: Yes it did apply to the Warsaw Pact nations. Hundreds of personal interviews I have done with people from Bulgaria, GDR, Romania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, etc. saw you are not only wrong, but incredibly wrong. Have you ever spoken with someone who lived there during the time of Communism? If not, well...


When did you interview them? After the collapse where life was absolutely miserable?


No, it did not 'work until Gorbachev betrayed..." It was folding like an accordion. He should be credited with giving the crumbling building a soft landing. Are you really this ignorant of actual history?
Are you reading ANYTHING that is not first handed to you by a group that supports Communism?

People did not want the Soviet Union to collapse. People even marched to the parliament in 1993 to protect the Duma from Yeltsin's troops. Eventually, Yeltsin ordered tanks and shot at the building. That's evil. Also, shock therapy was evil. If you understand Russian, watch this documentary on the events that took place in 1993. http://video.mail.ru/mail/valentina-lew/35/46.html

Again, I laughed outloud when I read this. Many farms had minimal equipment. People still worked the fields. Every fall at harvest time they would cancel school and bring in students and military personnel by the hundreds of thousands across the nation to harvest by hand because they did not have the equipment to do it.
Massive coal mines didn't have simple mining equipment and men with picks were still doing the majority of the work.
Even in Moscow, St. Petersburg (then Leningrad), Smolensk, Orel, Minsk, etc. they had manual labor to sweep the streets, remove snow, etc. because the gov't didn't have the infrastructure.
Again, these are simple, easily confirmable facts. You either simply did not know or are chosing to ignore.

:huh: It's common knowledge that Russia, especially Ukraine (the grain belt), had equipment. Ukraine has some of the most fertile soil in the land. There were many factories in the SU that where developing combines and tractors and sent them directly to the farmers. In fact, those who were interested in agriculture were sent to a university and got a masters on agriculture. Those people had to know what time of the year to plant crops, which crops to plant, how to fix broken machinery, how to deal with diseased crops, etc. A lot of farmers where sent to Brazil if I'm not mistaken.

Mines, factories, etc. has quotas. The people in these factories met the quotas but chose not to exceed them. Why? Because if they did, the quota for the next month would be even higher and they would be in trouble if they didn't meet it. If they met it, it would be even higher the next month.

Many factories literally had a flurry of work the first part of the day and then people sat around getting drunk the rest of the day because they had to remain there.

I was talking about the Marxism. Not the Soviet Union.

There is a book calld "MIG Pilot" about Victor Belenko who defected by flying his MIG to Japan in the 70s.
What he detailed and proven accurate after the Communism fell would turn your stomach....................................if you were actually interested in knowing the facts.

I have heard of him and I might have to read this book. Do you think that he could have been bribed by the United States. He was offered work and a home in the United States if he defected.
 

Martin W.

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Wakka

Lets put your Marxist theory to the test. We will start a commune using pure communist doctrines .

I only have one stipulation , I am to be in charge , and you are to be the peasant.


As you can tell , I have already grasped the fundamental reason people want communism , and I have only been one for 5 minutes.
 

Wakka

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Listen. I don't want to hold on to the past. The Soviet Union is long and over with. I'm simply unhappy with what I see happening on Wall Street.

Also, you have a false notion of a commune. In a commune, you and I would both have vote on what to do with our workplace. It would be called a cooperative. Another thing, Marx wrote the Manifesto for the working class of the most industrialized nation at that time, Germany. A dilemma that the Bolsheviks had to overcome was to create a working class out of nothing. Russia was predominantly peasant and illiterate. The ideology seeks to develop equality and cooperation, what happened in the SU was an abuse of power.
 

Martin W.

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Every time I meet a die-hard socialist or communist I ask them to share with me all their possessions. They always decline.

The underlying motive of the promoters of socialism and communism is to "manage" how people should live but they themselves are never willing to have anyone "manage" their lives.

It has always been about control. It has never been about equality.
 

Brother Mike

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Martin W
Every time I meet a die-hard socialist or communist I ask them to share with me all their possessions. They always decline.

I got some of those fabled Chocolate bunnies I'll share............

After reading this for some time, I have to come to a conclusion that the communist system does work. When I see people that are against it, it is the way People behave, and not the system. A system is only good as the character of the people that run it.

It would seem the missing element to the communist system would be the Love of God. The system does not make things better, it's the those people that are full of love, and Character that make the system work.


Jesus Is Lord.
 

Martin W.

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The only way communism could succeed would require 100% participation by the people.

Because then 100% of the people would be in control.

At that point you have created the free enterprise capitalist system.

Think deep my friends , think deep.

Hope you get it.

Martin W.
 

Kilenee

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First of all I am very pleased with the calm tempers in this discussion. Most threads of this nature quickly devolve into name calling.
One of the major issues with Cuba right now is not necessarily the fault of Fidel, but a result of the fall of the Soviet Union. Cuba lost something like 75% of their trade during the 1990s, and the US embargo continued. Don't you think it's evil that the US Foreign policy blocks prosperity to another nation? This blockade is absolutely pointless.

Basic info on what life in Cuba is like: http://library.think...daily_life.html


The situation in Cuba right now is only tangentially related to the fall of the Soviet Union. Their problems are much more related to the trade embargo maintained by the United States and the countless attempts the U.S. has made to overthrow or weaken their government. And that considered, Cuba is holding up quite well. There have been no major food shortages, poverty is far lower than would be reasonably expected, and so on. Not to say that I support the current Cuban regime, because I don't. I have a number of problems with command economies and with the limited (although still somewhat present) freedoms of expression.


Wakka,

Let’s get something straight.
You said:



Then you said in the shoutbox:



I answered:



Then I said:



You answered:


My response:
No joke young man. Capitalism in the USA makes possible a new product call Quietus for tinnitus, a Communist country would not make a product like that.

Would you have been allowed to ask for Prayer publicly in a Communist country? You could in the USA.


I have a couple of diseases as well. I'm not a medical expert, but with the two diseases I have (which aren't exactly rare), the U.S. is lagging far, far behind the rest of the First World's medical systems with respects to prices, support, even care provided and medicines. Once again I would remind you that I am just speaking on personal experience, but for me, the more socialized the medical system the better. For me.

YEAH ...RIGHT!!!!!! THEN WHY ARE THE SOCIAL SECURITY, MEDICARE, MEDICAID AND WE
LFARE PROGRAMS BEING CUT.
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Right now this so called capitalist country is being took down the communist path by the powers that be in DC. if we don't do something we will be in the same shape or worse than russia or cuba or even china.


Don't kid yourself. Ron Paul himself came out recently and said that Obama wasn't a socialist. He's so much more of a corporatist, something that almost every president since FDR at the least has been.

Foreigner: Most of the things you just said are reasons why the USSR should not be considered a socialist state in the slightest. You too Wakka. There have been very few regions in the world that have ever followed much from the Communist Manifesto, or Das Kapital, or any other of Marx's works. The nations pay lip service to him, of course, because that allows them to be supported by the lower classes instead of having to hold down each and every peasant. China is almost full capitalist now, North Korea is essentially fascist. The USSR was more a state capitalist system, where the nation itself controlled the means of production. True communism is a system that relies on the democratic control of the means of production, so the only way a nation could possibly attain this would be if they were fully democratic. Leon Trotsky was s big supporter of democracy, which was why he was kicked out by Stalin. Which brings me to the next point: Communism can only truly be achieved with an internationalist perspective. Another integral part of the system is that communists believe that class ties bind people together more than national ties. Therefore, it should be as ludicrous to hear the term "Socialism in One Nation" as it should be to hear "Libertarian Dictatorships": or something of that ilk.
Noam Chomsky also had a few words on the supposed "Communism" of the USSR:

"One can debate the meaning of the term 'socialism,' but if it means anything, it means control of production by the workers themselves, not owners and managers who rule them and control all decisions, whether in capitalist enterprises or an absolutist state.

"To refer to the Soviet Union as socialist is an interesting case of doctrinal doublespeak. The Bolshevik coup of October 1917 placed state power in the hands of Lenin and Trotsky, who moved quickly to dismantle the incipient socialist institutions that had grown up during the popular revolution of the preceding months -- the factory councils, the Soviets, in fact any organ of popular control - and to convert the workforce into what they called a 'labor army' under the command of the leader.

"In any meaningful sense of the term 'socialism,' the Bolsheviks moved at once to destroy its existing elements. No socialist deviation has been permitted since. ...

"The world's two major propaganda systems (the United States and the Soviet Union) did not agree on much, but they did agree on using the term socialism to refer to the immediate destruction of every element of socialism by the Bolsheviks. That's not too surprising. The Bolsheviks called their system socialist so as to exploit the moral prestige of socialism.

"The West adopted the same usage for the opposite reason: to defame the feared libertarian ideals by associating them with the Bolshevik dungeon, to undermine the popular belief that there really might be progress towards a more just society with democratic control over its basic institutions and concern for human needs and rights.

"If socialism is the tyranny of Lenin and Stalin, then sane people will say: not for me. And if that's the only alternative to corporate state capitalism, then many will submit to its authoritarian structures as the only reasonable choice. ...

"Why should workers agree to be slaves in a basically authoritarian structure? They should have control over it themselves. Why shouldn't communities have a dominant voice in running the institutions that affect their lives?"

Wakka

Lets put your Marxist theory to the test. We will start a commune using pure communist doctrines .

I only have one stipulation , I am to be in charge , and you are to be the peasant.


As you can tell , I have already grasped the fundamental reason people want communism , and I have only been one for 5 minutes.


See above.

The only way communism could succeed would require 100% participation by the people.

Because then 100% of the people would be in control.

At that point you have created the free enterprise capitalist system.

Think deep my friends , think deep.

Hope you get it.

Martin W.

That would be true if you believed that in our free enterprise system everyone had access to enough means of production to provide for themselves and their family. Clearly, this is not the case.
The only way capitalism can run as it was truly intended is with no national borders, no immigration restrictions, with 100% of people knowing 100% of the options and prices for 100% of goods and services. Is this reflected in reality? No. Have we thrown away capitalism because it's unrealistic? No.

I could go on about British Guyana, Chile and the other Latin American nations and the strides they were making until the U.S. backed coups of the 70s and 80s. I could talk about Italy, where a coalition of Communists and Christian Democrats were governing until the U.S. government backed the assassination of the communists and nationwide repression, or about Nepal and Cyprus which are both led by democratically elected Communist parties. I could talk about Tanzania, Sri Lanka, Egypt, and Bangladesh which all have references to socialism in their constitution. I could talk about capitalist dictatorships (What? Who ever heard of such a thing?) such as Franquist Spain, Indonesia, nearly all of Latin America at some point or another. The list goes on and on.
Or I could talk about the 10th Commandment, and the Book of Acts. I could talk about Liberation Theology, Christian Anarchists, Christian Communists, Ammon Hennacy, Dorothy Day, The Catholic Workers, and Leo Tolstoy.

I could talk about a lot of things. And believe me, I like to talk.
 

Wakka

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I don't know where you came from, or who you are, but thank you for the much needed clarification. I'm just not articulate enough, I guess. :(

I'll leave a quote by Dom Hélder Camara, a Brazillian bishop who was the voice of the poor.

"For me, men are not divided into believers and atheists, but between oppressors and oppressed, between those who want to keep this unjust society and those who want to struggle for justice."

You can read about him, and of the subsequent South American socialist movement here: http://links.org.au/node/1151
 

Selene

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In my house
In my personal opinion, God is already a king. His kingdom is Heaven, and I would think that the type of government He runs would be based on obedience. It's neither capitalism nor communism because in Heaven I don't think you need to work to get what you need. God provides and it is God who is in control.
 

Jonathan

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"The road to hell is paved with good intentions."

also read the communist manifesto and you will know communism is godless.

also capitalism is an economic system not a government. Americas government is a Republic. Communism is a economy by the government.

also again America is going from a Republic to Socialism. dont blame all the bad laws in this country on capitalism or a republic, when socialist and communist laws are being passed.
 

Grat

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...The best system of government was given to the Hebrews when they entered the promised land. Yes they where all given an allotment of land (the basic basis of all wealth) and they where gareneteed to keep that land even if they got into debt (debt was forgiven every 7 years i think and all property was returned) But their personal prosperity was determined by how well they used their allotment of land, how diligent they where in their work. This system at the base was egalitarian but it also needed personal responsibility of each land owner to ensure they got the best result from the basic egalitarian base. Something that communism failed to do was give each person responsibility for the economic resources they where using. They had and have no personal ownership and therefore responsibility in the system. That was the built in flaw with communism. One that was not present in the promised land....
Not criticising, Adstar, just a little correction. All debts were cancelled every 7 years, land was returned to its original owner (except in very specific circumstances) every Jubilee year (49 or 50 years depending upon how you count it).

Grat
 

Grat

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I’ve always found scripture pretty politically neutral. Paul encouraged us to pray for our leaders that we would live in peace.
We live in a fallen world; none of the systems will completely work. Democracy seems to give the greatest opportunities for the individual, but also tends to be reactive, not proactive (governments usually react once the people are concerned, not before). Monarchy would probably be potentially the most proactive, but it depends completely on the monarch. Socialism and Communism have never worked in any place long enough to really see anything except greed (except maybe in the Israel Kibbutz).
Free Enterprise isn’t a political system and will never completely work because man is fallen.
As soon as any of you start relying on the government to fulfil your responsibilities as an individual Christian you’ve condemned the government to failure.
We are in the mess we are in simply because the Church has abdicated its responsibilities to governments. We as Christians will do far more for the poor, disadvantaged, disfranchised, sick and downtrodden as individuals and groups then any government can. We don’t prop up. We don’t teach people to be “better people”. We don’t “force” equality. We help in the process to radically transform lives into living testament to the majesty, glory and power of our Risen Lord.

Grat