On The Social Gospel and Socialism

In his critique concerning the conceit of Socialism and the error of attributing "intellectual respectability" to Socialism, Father Robert Sirico states:

"Among the clergy, there was a gravely flawed view of justice and the role of the gospel -that is to say, of how the gospel was to be applied to social circumstances. Clergymen generally regarded any inequality in wealth as inherently suspect and even as evidence of exploitation and injustice. Lacking understanding of how economies grow and distribute wealth, they believed that only a central authority could 'apportion resources' with an eye to helping the poor, the aged, and the underprivileged. Lacking business experience, they could not conceive of the contribution that entrepreneurs and businessmen made to the growth of an economy. They thought only of dividing wealth more fairly, not of generating more wealth."

- Father Robert. A Sirico, "Economics on the Left: From Marxism to Keynesianism," in The Age of the Economists From Adam Smith to Milton Friedman, 31-42 (Hillsdale, MI: Hillsdale College Press, 1999).