Blackwell Reference Online

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[xiii.b] Early Christian social concern was largely evinced in individual charitable work. This has never ceased to be practised, but links between church and state (see State, christianity and the) brought wider responsibilities, and complications. Thus the medieval church tried to curb and civilize warfare by the concepts of God's Peace and God's Truce. But it fostered the Crusades, and pacifism has always been a minority Christian view [65: vii]. Slavery [165] was originally tolerated and even justified theologically (except by minorities), although eventually attacked under Christian influence. Established churches have tended to endorse the existing social and political order, especially where favourable to the church. This has coexisted with relief of suffering and moralizing campaigns (especially by Protestantism) against limited problems like alcohol and Sunday work. Traditional theology placed a high value on work and regarded private property as divinely ordained. Roman-catholicism has traditionally regarded poverty as a source of virtue, but Protestantism sometimes saw it as a sign of moral failure. In modern times most churches have come to approve of collective and state action for social welfare [19: 275–9; 35]. This has been given theological expression in the American Protestant Social gospel [93]; Social Catholicism [191]; and, most radically, in Christian Socialism ... log in or subscribe to read full text