Practical Christianity: An Epitome of Practical Christian Socialism - Softcover

Practical Christian Socialism (1854) was Adin Ballou's most comprehensive exposition of his fundamental principles and their application to personal and community life, ranging from theology and political theory to marriage, child-rearing, and a surprisingly frank discussion of sexuality.

In Practical Christianity, Ballou's 655-page treatise has been edited to eliminate the cumbersome dialogue form in which it was originally written. All of the language is Ballou's own, and nothing is omitted except a final section in which he compared Practical Christian Socialism to competing varieties of utopian socialism popular at the time.

Adin Ballou (1803-1890), the founder of the utopian community of Hopedale, Massachusetts, was a leading nineteenth-century pacifist, socialist, and abolitionist. Unlike many other reformers of his time Ballou did not abandon his pacifist principles during the Civil War. His version of pacifism, which he called Christian Non-Resistance, was admired by Leo Tolstoy and, through Tolstoy, influenced the great twentieth-century non-violent activists, Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

The Hopedale Community (1841-1856) was based upon pacifism and "Practical Christian Socialism," a form of socialism that, unlike Marxism, included a place for private property and the profit motive.