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Don’t turn Christmas into opium of the poor

One of Karl Marx’s most quoted statements is that religion is the opium of the poor. Often, this dictum is taken for truth. Many oppositionists to religion anchor their arguments on this aphorism to discredit faith, especially painting religious leaders as oppressors of the poor.

Of course, this view is largely taken out of the context in which Karl Marx, a lawyer and philosopher, intellectualised it. The rich, who owned the means of production, exploited the poor, and Marx could not see religion as the solace of the poor when they had nowhere else to turn to.

Marx argued that “religion is the sigh of...