Christianity and Capitalism
Humanities' need for religion has almost always come from a need to find the reasoning behind suffering. Christianity answers many people’s questions with the idea that if you suffer now, you will achieve the promised land; heaven, later. The ideology that temporary suffering will lead to the promised land is an ideology that has been pervasive in Western life since the Byzantine Empire of eastern Rome, but an ideology most recently the most powerful since Western Slavery and the colonization of Africa. The usage of Christianity to control enslaved and colonized populations were converted, at the end of slavery and direct colonization, to manipulate and control the working-class masses; leading them to believe that if they were to work harder and suffer temporarily then they could achieve a better life or even a promised land.
It is important to understand, however, that Christianity in its totality is not guilty of the former. Christianity is only corrupt in places it did not originate or spread to naturally, which is virtually everywhere except East and North Africa and parts of the Middle East. East Africa, North Africa, and parts of the Middle East are all areas mentioned in the Bible and are locations where Christianity is practiced relatively unaffected by European capitalism. This form of Christianity, however, is largely foreign to the majority of the world.
Slavery and Christianity
A popular question asked by racially Black people when questioning North American slavery is, why did slaves remain enslaved and not revolt or rebel? Numerous answers to this question exist, some citing the Willie Lynch theory, the fact that White Americans outnumbered the enslaved population, and the lack of knowledge of how to operate firearms.
Prior to "Plymouth rock landing on" enslaved West Africans, West Africans practiced Islamic and African spirituality. Scholars estimated that as many as 30% of the enslaved population were Muslim (Khan). In order to "civilize" enslaved West Africans in America -- none of whom previously practiced or were introduced to Christianity -- a perverted form of Christianity was forced onto them. The "Slave Bible" that was taught to Black Americans purposefully omitted sections of the old testament and highlighted sections of the new testament that described the enslavement of Joseph (Little). The effect of the "Slave Bible" was the justification of slavery in the new religion of enslaved Africans. This was achieved through the idea that their suffering would lead them to paradise. The Slave Bible helped to knit the starkly Christian concept of "suffer now, prosper later" into the fabric of the labor class.
The idea that there was a promised land at the end of the suffering played the primary role in maintaining the complacency of enslaved Africans. Regardless of whether or not the "suffer now, prosper later" ideology is integral to what "true" Christianity is, the ideology and value is the central message of Western Christianity. As religion serves to give a reason and method of escape from suffering, Western Christianity does the former and ignores the latter. "Accept things as they are", "never question your environment", "suffer now, and prosper later."
Race and religion in America
The law of the conservation of energy asserts that energy cannot be destroyed nor created, only converted from one form to the next. By applying the same logic to the "ending" of slavery, it can be asserted that slavery never ended but was merely converted to a larger working class that encompassed the racial lines. The practices used to psychologically stunt "slaves," or the labor class, from desiring to live outside of a system that oppresses them, were also converted to apply to a class that was no longer physically incapacitated.
Once the working class was no longer defined as clearly as slaves and non-slaves, a phenomenon of infighting amongst the working class on the basis of racial superiority was manufactured. America's owner class successfully convinced – through the relegation of the enslaved class to second-class citizens – one faction of America's working class that they were superior to the other faction of America's working class. The illusion of superiority had two effects in dividing the working class, it gave the non-Black American faction a new and false enemy: Black Americans; and gave Black Americans two new enemies: non-Black Americans and the owner class. Although the battle of race is and was manufactured, the real-life implications of the battle still play out and affect Black Americans today.
The secondary and almost more pervasive method that the owner class manipulated to dictate the perception and psychology of the working class is religion. Martin Luther King Jr. said, "11 o'clock on Sunday morning is one of the most segregated hours, if not the most segregated in Christian America." The primary facet of this quote is the racial predicament existing at 11 o'clock on Sunday morning, but the alternative facet of this quote is the power of Christianity. The power Christianity holds over the country to make a most "segregated hour," its power to dictate the majority of America's time, and ultimately its power to center America around a central hearth: the church.
Capitalism + Christianity, how did they mix?
The warping of Christianity in America through televangelism and Christian-tailored capitalist propaganda — especially bolstered in the 50s — primarily worked to make Christianity synonymous with American capitalism and to stunt progress. In the 1920s the teaching of Darwinism in schools and the infamous outlawing of such material by the Supreme Court, brought conservative evangelicals into mass media, starting with Amy Simple Mcpherson. Mcpherson's questioning of evolution on the basis of Christianity was met with much support from American evangelists who brought her to Los Angeles and gave her a megaphone to begin "evangelizing." Mcpherson was instrumental in creating the first American megachurch, and the root of her fame being the questioning of progressive ideologies like Darwinism, which initialized the conflation of conservatism and evangelism.
Evangelism itself is a form of Christianity that centers around the spreading of the gospel, God's word, through public witness or preaching. The denomination was founded alongside colonization and slavery in the 18th century in Britain and in British colonies in North America. Evangelism exists more as a method of spreading Christianity, than a formal denomination with rules; however, it exists as a core method of protestant Christianity which is the form that dominates much of the colonized afro-diaspora.
As conservatism and evangelism go hand in hand, the reach of evangelism began to go further and became influential in nearly all aspects of working-class life. The reach was fueled by the access that evangelicals had to radio, television, and other forms of media consumed by the working class. By the 50's more than 90% of America identified as Christian, and the dominant Christian denomination of that time in the media was evangelism. Conservative evangelicalism influenced the establishment of churches in working-class neighborhoods, especially Black American neighborhoods, and fostered a culture of Christianity in working-class environments. In the same nature that there are multiple churches in every Black American or working-class neighborhood, there were churches on every plantation in the United States.
Colonization and Christianity
The colonization of West Africa and the enslavement/colonization of the Caribbean brought the same warped form of Christianity that had been brewed by capitalists in Britain and America to those places. The introduction of Christianity through the enslavement, massacres, and colonization of West Africa forced Christianity down the throats of previously non-Christian individuals.
The concept of "civilizing" a country, as it related to West and Central Africa, was the forced adoption of Christianity and the forced demonization of indigenous belief systems and practices. This institutionalization of a foreign and warped religion in West and Central Africa created a connection to Black Americans and Caribbeans which was the idolization of Christianity and the forced stunting of the social, economic, and political progression of the people. Through Christianity, colonists retained underdevelopment in West Africa and kept the countries working for the benefit of capitalism.
Ultimately, the forced adoption of a colonist and capitalist religion by Europeans onto West Africans resulted in the rejection of original spiritual beliefs and the implementation of European societal beliefs such as gender roles, the restricting of sexuality, and the general intolerance of social progression. The effect that forced adoption had on the family and community structure was profound, bringing West Africans to be against any form of radical progress, effectively stunting their social, political, and economic progression as well.
Clayton Christensen, an American academic, made an interesting comment on the phenomenon of the institutionalization of capitalism in countries without a religious base. He said: "if you don't have the foundation of a religion there, [in a place where you wish to place "democracy" and "free markets"] and not just any religion but it's got to be a religion that has enough power over people's lives that they instinctively follow those rules."
The effect
The infiltration of working-class environments by Christianity had the effect of stunting progress — as was the initial intention behind American and colonist Christianity. By rooting itself as a central belief system of working-class people, Christianity effectively became the main tool by capitalists/colonists to ensure that the working class would not question their socioeconomic conditions, and rather remain complacent within them.
American/Colonist Christianity presented the idea of "suffer now, prosper later" as a central value of Christianity to all who were forced to adopt the religion. The idea directly discouraged rebellion in working-class people, and encouraged the acceptance of an unfair and unjust environment, as it would only be a temporary condition. Such an idea was further fortified by the capitalist value of "work hard, prosper later," where one is still expected to accept their unfair conditions in exchange for unguaranteed and unattainable riches.
Christianity, as spread by colonists and capitalists across the world, has the primary and ultimate goal of stunting progress and encapsulating those who it touches under the clutches of capitalism. As a religion, Christianity discourages and demonizes the questioning or challenging of the status quo; it encourages people to follow blindly and accept the fact that if they suffer now they will prosper later or that if they work hard they will achieve prosperity.