Catholic workers recognized that the socialist aim of improving the living conditions of the poor overlapped with Catholicism, but were concerned about the anti-clericalism and anti-theism of socialism.
It gained the attention of numerous prominent socialists - Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, for example, praised the movement, and argued tha the Acts of the Apostles "showed perfectly how communism was practised among ancient Christian communities".
Claudia Baldoli noted that "the Christian spirit that permeated the speeches of some well-known socialist leaders proved powerful enough to prompt conversions to the priesthood".
Miglioli argued that the Catholic demands of social justice and charity could only be obtained through a revolution; he noted that a policy that did not accept class struggle would be stillborn as no collaboration or solidarity could be expected from the landowners.
Koestler argued that the communist and Catholic utopia were highly compatible, although he would abandon Marxism's because of Marx's claim about religion that "in the brightness of day the lamp would become superfluous".
He praised the Constitution of the Soviet Union as an "evangelical document" and argued that Bolsheviks spoke to peasantry in biblical language: "The peasants received the land they needed for their work, and no one would be allowed to exploit them or to become rich at the expense of their efforts.
"[6] The expression Catholic communism also appears in the writings of Augusto Del Noce (see Il cattolico comunista , 1981) and Gianni Baget Bozzo.