So the Pope is a marxist.... (wait for it)

[ShadowHM]

I don't want to confuse Christianity with the Christian Church (esp. that one in Rome), and its history of using scripture for its own enrichment and power.

I don't see how you can tease the two apart. Without those alliances between early Christian leaders and their governments, Christianity as we know it would not exist today.

And, as a corollary to the above and apropos of your comments about the state of the RC Church in Minnesota:

The historian and moralist, who was otherwise known simply as Lord Acton, expressed this opinion in a letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton in 1887:

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.