“Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”
-Karl Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, Introduction
The double function of #religion - #oppressive or #liberating - has been observed by several commentators.
Perhaps, most notably, by German social psychologist Erich Fromm [Marx's Concept of Man, 1961] and Scottish-American philosopher, Alasdair MacIntyre [ #Marxism and #Christianity, 1971].