Religious Revolution Quotes



During the Spanish Civil War, the Roman Catholic Church—the only major Christian Church in Spain—sided with the Fascists in overthrowing the elected government and ousting the king. The church also supported the German Nazi bombing of undefended Spanish towns where there were concentrations of Republicans supporting the elected government. While there were a few Catholic worker priests on the Republican side, the church buildings and the hierarchy of the Church was part of the Fascist axis. Therefore churches were burned whenever possible, often with the help and participation of the Catholic worker priests many of whose churches had been bombed. Although Durruti often said this, he did not originate it; Peter Kropotkin did.


While this is very true in the long term, the Church in the short term has almost always supported actively or by its neutrality, the ruling class as opposed to those who would make revolutionary change even to the extent of participating in the torture, murder, and intimidation of most of the Catholics in the society. The ruling class, in turn, supported the Church and used the power of the state to enforce religious doctrine and prevent alternative religious views and practices to prevail even if only with small minorities. See {632407} for another Mises quotation articulating examples of this.